1001 Albums Summary

Nice, easy-listening album, I particularly enjoyed the more 'jazzy' songs, 'Bye Bye Love' and 'Just A Little Lovin'' 74/100

Interesting, quite varied as well which is nice, at times it reminded me alternatively of David Bowie, Bob Dylan or Jimmy Hendrix, whilst still retaining the rock sound. None of the tracks stood out to me as outright favourites but they were overall enjoyable. 61/100

Difficult to rate, had some decent songs - I liked 'A quick one whilst he's away' and 'Magic Bus' had some cool harmonica, the start of my generation was good but it didn't need to be 15 minutes long. Other than those songs nothing stood out overly and Im not a huge fan of the way Rogery Daltrey sings. 45/100 Score edited 28/01/26

I like jazz music but there wasn't much too this one, pleasant and added a certain vibe to my pasta cooking, but not much more than that. 49/100 Score edited 28/01/26

I've quite a hard time rating this, if I could give 3 and a half I would but unfortunely given the rating system I couldn't warrant a 4. There were quite a few good songs, abattoir blues and hiding all away (albeit with the odd lyrics of the latter) were good, and O Children, which I recognised from Harry Potter was the highlight of the album for me. If the album had been full of songs like this it could have easily achieved 4 stars but fable of the brown ape and babe you turn me on, amongst others, just didn't stand up to this and in these songs his voice could be a little boring if not annoying at times. My criticisms are not to say that this is a bad album, just that it was inconsistent and so overall sits at decent, but not great. 65/100 Score edited 28/12/25 Score edited 11/01/26

I hadn't listened to much Stevie Wonder before this and I was pleasantly surprised at how good this was. I enjoyed every song on the album, in particular I thought "village ghetto land" was quite a beautiful song and was followed by "contusion" which had some great guitar sections. "Summer soft" was a good 'bop' and was very nice to listen to. I also enjoyed the lyrics and message of "Black man". Really enjoyable overall, great listen. 84/100 Score edited 28/01/26

Not the typical thing I'd listen to but it was pretty decent, to be honest not many of the songs stood out to me as much better than the others, I liked Spaceboy and Luna a decent amount and thought disarm was a little crap. There was some cool guitar, especially in silverfuck, but I don't really love the "cool guitar" sound, I tend to focus more on singing, which here was alright but nothing incredible for me. Having a hard time placing this between 3 and 4. 67/100 Score edited 11/01/26

I enjoyed this, didn't know that they sang 'good times' which is a very good song, the bassline in that reminded me of wham, although apparently its used in rappers delight which makes sense. I also thought it sounded like 'Le freak' which it turns out they also song. I also liked 'will you cry' later on. That being said the songs were somewhat 'samey' so not many stood out beyond this. 69/100 Score edited 28/12/25 Score edited 13/01/26

I enjoyed this, especially some of the longer instrumental, quasi-psychedelic songs. I especially liked The Eleven and Turn on Your Love Light. Was a bit existential about rating music in general today but I'll give this as much as a relative rating as possible. 63/100 Score and Rating edited 28/12/25 Score edited 01/01/26 Score edited 11/01/26 Score edited 28/01/26

Weird, it feels like I'm listening to some sort of musical French audiobook starring a mysterious and coldhearted detective in love with a woman melody. Also the detective is very hot. I don't really get it to be honest, maybe if my French was better, the music is alright, but not much more than that. He really did appear to be 'en melody'. 40/100 Score edited 28/01/26

I feel like I preface every high rating with 'not what I usually listen to but...' which again is true here, I'll probably have to come around to good music not belonging to a single genre, how shocking. These were good songs, I've heard some of them before but never connected to the band so this is the first I'd heard of MGMT. The songs feel like, with a few more listens, they'd be very catchy and I liked both the vocals and music, I didn't really listen out for the lyrics much though so I may have missed something there. Overall very enjoyable, at least in comparison to other day's albums, still learning to rate things properly. Having had the weekend to think about this I don't remember it feeling like a 5 star album, but clearly I thought that at the time. 77/100 Score and Rating edited 06/01/26 Score edited 18/01/26

Cool guitar throughout, but I wasn't a huge fan of some of the singing, especially in songs like Beautiful Ones. Darling Nikki was very odd. Prince is a very iconic artist and I must say that given what I've heard this was somewhat disappointing, it wasn't bad but it certainly wasn't great, Purple Rain was definitely the best song on the album, very unsurprisingly, but beyond that and perhaps when doves cry the rest weren't brilliant. 64/100 Score edited 28/12/25 Score edited 11/06/25

This was... fine, I really don't have much to say about it, it felt very generic and I can't say I cared much about it either way. I'm really unsure why this would be in any list of albums you must, it's not bad per se, just not good. 46/100

Difficult to rate, on the day this was set I listened to about half but I didn't have a chance to finish it, I hadn't been enjoying it that much then, but listening to it today I thought it was quite good. The first half of the album was more enjoyable than the second, I was quite confident I'd rate it a four but started to change my mind as it continued. I feel like I say every 60s group sounds like Beatles, I suppose they defined the era and did enough genre that it's easy to find some similarities, I definitely thought that was the case for Caledonia mission which was one of my favourites, sounded more late 60s Beatles. Some songs also reminded me of the rolling stones which is probably a similar situation. Debilitated a lot between 3 and 4, I've had to change quite a few ratings based on current feelings and to fit this where it needs to go it'll have to be a 4 despite the weaker second half. 73/100

Christmas. 60/100 Score edited 28/01/26

They certainly didn't mess about with telling us the title of the album. I really enjoyed this, Simon and Garfunkel are excellent songwriters and have very good harmonies. Through different songs in the album I was reminded of a variety of different 60s musicians, The Beatles sometimes came through in their harmonies and there were traces of Dylan in many songs, especially 'A Simple Desultory Philippic' which surely must have been made with this in mind. I also liked the references to other songs and artists, Dylan's 'Girl from the North Country' was referenced almost straight away and in later songs so too were Mick Jagger, Dylan's 'Rainy Day Woman' and Joan Baez's 'Silver Dagger'. I also felt that the tune at the start of 'The Dangling Conversation' was a near on to one match with that at the start of 'Blowing in the wind', at least the version from 'A complete unknown'. I enjoyed the songs across the board, but in particular 'Scarborough Fair', 'The Dangling Conversation' and '7 o'clock news' stood out as favourites. 87/100 Score edited 28/01/26

Really pleasant and enjoyable listen, Sarah Vaughan has an incredible voice, very clear and soulful that goes excellent with the lovely piano. I like the live recording atmosphere, the laughter from the patrons and ad libs on the songs make for a very immersive album and it's not difficult to imagine being in the jazz club in Chicago when this was recorded. September in the rain and Willow weep for me were particularly good with the latter perhaps being my favourite although they were all very good with How high the moon being perhaps the only slight dip in quality. A part of me feels this could be five stars but for now it's a high four. 79/100

This album felt like it had no identity, is it meant to be a rock album? a country album? If so it failed at both. All the songs felt incredibly generic and had no personality as well as not being that great vocally or instrumentally. I don't want to give this one star as I didn't find it egregious, but I certainly didn't find any enjoyment in listening to it so it's a decently low two. I am surprised by the inclusion of this in '1001 albums you must listen to' and even more so that it got three Grammy nominations. 30/100 Score and Rating edited 28/01/26

I enjoyed this, I must say that I didn't listen to the album as intently as I try to, so it's difficult to pick out a favourite, or indeed least favourite song. The music was nice as was the singing, beyond that it's hard to add much. This is on the upper end of three but I'd struggle to give it a four, perhaps if I'd listened better I may have been able to. 67/100 Score edited 11/06/26

Me: Mum can I go and see Oasis Mum: We have Oasis at home Oasis at home: To be honest that probably shows my lack of knowledge on this genre of music but oh well. This was alright, I think the title track was probably the best on the album but none were incredibly better than the rest, I can't say I love Brit Pop but this was fine. I incorrectly thought I had finished this album yesterday but hadn't listened to the last three songs, which I must say were some of the better ones on the album. I still can't give this the full four stars but it was closer than I initially thought. 66/100 Score edited 11/01/26

Expected female singers at first with the name being violent femmes. The song was alright, Folk Punk is a decent genre. I particularly liked "Kiss Off" but I didn't like the last two songs all that much, they leaned a little more punky than the rest. Overall not an awful album but nothing too interesting either. 61/100 (This does not fit well with my other scorings)

I’ve decided to do this song by song which is unusual for me in the hopes that I’d be paying a little more attention and may have something more to say. Around the world was enjoyable, it followed the general theme in this album of me not knowing the song but feeling as though I’ve heard it before - perhaps I have listened to this album before without realising. The singing in this song, and throughout the album, is very distinctive. Parallel universe is decent, the singing at the start was nice, I can recognise that the instruments at the end were played well but it is a little heavier than my usual tastes. Scar tissue was pretty good. Otherside is another I felt I knew, it was enjoyable, but again, as with other songs on the album, I’m unsure how much the fact I knew the songs changes how good I think they are, though I suppose that is a bias that I can’t escape. On the other hand I may have heard particular songs before as they are the ‘better ones’ so it may not reflect this too strongly. Get on top was okay, one of the weaker ones of the album. I didn’t like the ‘rap-style’ songs as much as the sung ones, the instruments weren’t too interesting either. Californication is quite obviously the best on the album, it is goated both with and without the sauce. I knew both easily and porcelain, the latter of which I enjoyed quite a lot. Emit Remmus was okay, forgettable amongst the others though ‘I like dirt’ was fine but suffered from some of the same ‘issues’ as Get on top, that being said the music was nice and groovy. What’s more I also like dirt. Little to say about this velvet glove. Saviour was good, I liked the ‘harmony’ sections if they can be called that. Purple Stain was decent, cool music at the end. Right on time was short but alright. I can’t say I was paying as much attention through Road Trippin. Overall a very good album filled with some great songs and none that were particularly bad, though a few as mentioned were weaker than the rest. I couldn’t give this five stars as it wasn’t quite as consistently great as I’d have liked, though about half of the songs in this album could achieve five stars alone, also it just doesn’t have the same ‘powerful’ quality I get from my other five star albums. This did make me requestion MGMT’s position though. 78/100 Score edited 18/01/26

I had written a little about the first half of the album but it has been deleted. Overall the album was alright though certainly not what I expected from the beach boys, I thought it'd be much more upbeat and less melancholy, I don't know if this was more common for the beach boys or if this album was different. I did think that with it being called 'surf's up' it might be referring to a surf ending rather than just the beach saying. The songs were largely not too exciting, some were relatively pleasant, disney girls perhaps being a favourite alongside student demonstration town. The album art is really cool. 60/100

Yes it's quite generic but that doesn't make it bad. Some of the songs are a little whiney but most are pretty decent, I liked 'green eyes' and 'whisper' more than the others. Wasn't taking the effort to differentiate the songs at the end, they were alright, mostly acted as background music - neither overly good nor bad. 61/100 Score edited 28/01/26

It seems that I quite like soul, I wasn't really aware of that but I've thought both of the soul albums on the list have been good so far. The songs were quite enjoyable, some mellow others more 'upbeat' in so much as soul can be, and all were pleasant to listen to. Otis Redding has a nice voice, not quite Stevie Wonder, but it's nice. I of course know 'Be my baby' which was a highlight of the album, and also know 'Wonderful World', although I prefer the original Sam Cooke version with backing singers, still, this is a good song. 12 bar blues in 'Rock me baby' reminded me of a few songs, I'll thank year 8 music for teaching me what that is. One of these songs is, humorously, 'Feed me (git it)' from Little Shop of Horrors the musical, another is 'When a man loves a woman' though I'm less certain why that is. I also also know I can't get no satisfaction, but again the original by The Rolling Stones is the better version. All in all an enjoyable album, the latter half slightly better than the first. A lower four, but a four nonetheless. 74/100

I like the Beatles a lot but I feel their earlier era (not that they were around all that long all things considered) isn't quite as good for me, they're still excellent singers but I feel that they hadn't quite found their music yet and were still progressing in their song writing skills, they were hardly 20 here so I can't blame them and there's still some really good songs, but I knew going into this it wouldn't quite stack up against there many later albums. The highlights of the album for me were 'All my loving' a classic Beatles song, 'Roll over Beethoven' which was very rock and rollsy, as quite a few of the songs of this era were (an aside, it reminded me both of Elvis's 'Jail House Rock' and of course of the 1992 film Beethoven) as well as 'Money (that's what I want)', a song I knew but was less familiar with as a Beatles song. Unfortunately quite a few of the songs were relatively forgettable but were still largely decent, though 'don't bother me' was a bit of a low point. A strong three, nothing more. 70/100 Score edited 28/01/26

This isn't really 'my genre' which makes it slightly more difficult to rate, I have the typical problem that, not being so well versed in this type of music, a lot of it sounds similar to me, and as such this album did come across slightly 'samey' and I had difficulty differentiating between songs. That being said there were some that I found marginally better or worse, the better ones being "N.Y. State of Mind" (which I have only just realised in writing down that it may be a pun on 'New York State') and "It Ain't hard to tell" which unsurprisingly do seem to be the more popular ones on the album, and the slightly worse one being "One Love" which I didn't vibe with as much. I think that hip hop and rap are genres where lyricism is really allowed to thrive and this album did have its fair share of well written songs, at least the parts I had focused on, which is made all the more impressive knowing that Nas was just 19 or 20 when creating this album. I could definitely see people rating this more highly and I can recognise a well crafted album, even with minor 'flaws' but this is held back for me by my own preferences and as such I can only rate it based on my own enjoyment which was more than middling, but nothing incredible. Side note: the more I rate things the less confident I am with my rating system. 69/100 Score edited 28/01/26

'Heavier' than I expected in some songs for want of a better word, I know that the 60s and 70s were defining eras for early rock so I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised I'd just always thought The Doors would be more akin to something like the carpenters than to anything else, though I have no reason as to why I thought this. Interesting mix of instruments, not often you hear the likes of pianos and harmonicas alongside electric guitars and it doesn't sound too bad but unfortunately I found the singing uninteresting and not that great all things considered, particular in the louder more 'shouty' songs. Blue Sunday was enjoyable, but beyond that it was nothing special, little to say about other songs specifically. 46/100

Was quite enjoying it for the first five or so songs, very prepared to give it a 4 the way it was going but it did get slightly worse as the album progressed. I enjoyed the distorted guitar noises which reminded me of those in Courtney Barnett's Avant Gardener. The album had a very big mix of genres and styles which was interesting, I was surprised to find out that Beck was just one guy rather than a band, Novocaine was, in particular, notably different. The new pollution was probably the highlight of the album for me, with Where its at certainly not being where it was at and high five rock the catskills being disappointing also. The majority of the album was by no means bad but had certainly dropped off from the first lot of songs, so it'll have to be a high three rather than a 4. 68/100

Good album overall, most of the songs were nice yet not entirely 'interesting' at least in that I was able to study through them without thinking to much about the song that was playing. My favourites of the album were 'Man we was lonely', 'Momma Miss America', which had some nice guitar and 'Maybe I'm amazed' perhaps being the best one, with some nice vocals and upbeat instruments. I didn't quite 'get' the last song, a lot of it sounded like a band preparing their instruments to play a set. I think it's a shame that the first Beatles and Paul McCartney albums I've had have both been rated a 3, they've been pretty good, and both are higher threes but neither have been consistently great enough to make them fours, hopefully the next ones will improve on that. 68/100 Score edited 28/01/26

Listening notes from when I listened to it are gone so this is from memory. There were a range of decent and boring songs, their was certainly an overarching mysterious, perhaps almost spooky tone to the soundtrack which felt at times 'doctor who-esque'. One of the songs had some guitar that reminded of the film 'Labyrinth'. A little odd, without having seen the film and detached from visual aids a lot felt strange and I didn't have the context of the story which I'm sure would add more to this. Not a big fan of the cover art. 48/100 (Taking 50 as an average places this above average which doesn't reflect my feelings, this number instead puts it more in line with other ratings, may need to fix that soon) Score edited 28/01/26

Michael was likely a pedophile but for me rating albums is one of the rare occasions where I will allow myself to 'separate the art from the artist' in so much as that as possible. I enjoyed listening to this quite a lot, very typically MJ which is by no means a bad thing, it's what I expected from the album and it's definitely what I got. The more well known songs on the album are for me the better ones though its hard to tell which way around that's working as usual. 'The way you make me feel' and 'Man in the mirror' were probably the highlights for me with 'Liberian girl' being another, less expected good song. Some of the songs were more forgettable but that's more a case of not being familiar with them than of them being bad, I did enjoy the songs largely across the album. The album certainly didn't astound me really but the songs were consistently good and it was an enjoyable listen. 76/100 Score edited 28/01/26

Wasn't planning on doing a song by song but I feel that it might be good in order to say what I'd like to about them. Everything In Its Right Place: I hadn't realised the sound that's used in a lot of social media posts was from the start of this song. The song was alright, I didn't feel there was a huge amount 'to it', though it wasn't bad to listen to. I always feel like I'm more able to comment on songs with more singing (or at least more traditional singing) better, I still enjoy songs without, but being less knowledgeable on instrumental things its difficult to go past "I enjoyed this / didn't enjoy it", though maybe I'm thinking about it too deeply. Kid A: Odd choice for a title track, can't say I've heard it before, some pretty weird sounds. Again, this wasn't bad to listen to, I just didn't feel like there was much there. The National Anthem: Very similar vibe to the previous song, lots of weird music/noises, little to add. How to Disappear Completely: This is a song I could appreciate a lot more, it's definitely a well crafted song, Thom Yorke obviously has some odd vocals but they work well here. I think I heard him say in an interview once that this may be one of the greatest songs he has made. Treefingers: Never heard of this one, the music was pleasant enough, I'm interested in how some of these songs are performed in concert, if at all, perhaps as transitional pieces I suppose. The word esoteric came to mind when listening to this but upon looking it up I don't think it fits so unsure why I thought of it. Optimistic: I went into this one expecting it to be good and it was, guess you could say I was optimistic. Some nice vocals in this one and the instruments were more of a typical rock style which I think I prefer. In Limbo: Decent, very typical Radiohead I felt which is typically a good thing. Idioteque: one of the better ones on the album, certainly some of the strongest vocals for me, I enjoyed it. Morning Bell: felt somewhat similar to the prior song, another of the better ones, perhaps it's boring but it seems I like the more 'normal' songs. Motion picture soundtrack: Perhaps the best one yet, very nice singing, very nice music, very good song. Untitled: little to say, it is what it is. Overall this was an enjoyable album, particular the second half for me, it's not a five star album, I can see that Radiohead fans may give it that but it wasn't quite strong enough for me, some of the earlier songs felt a little empty. 75/100 Score edited 28/01/26

This was really good, a nice change from Vespertine which I know slightly better, I would hazard to say this may be the better even as I really like the layered vocals and the strange angelic qualities of the songs. I think many artists try either purposefully or otherwise to be odd or escape convention in music and often that leads to songs that just aren't nice to listen to, Bjork succeeds where these other musician fail, there's a really strong sense of artistry in her work and her oddness shines through as a purely positive trait. I can't give this five stars as I didn't love every single song on the album, though of course all were good. I'm surprised to see three four star albums in a row. Very prepared to get hate for giving this more than Radiohead. 79/100

I'll likely leave a shorter review as I didn't listen to this as much as I would usually an album. It was definitely a fun album, lots of upbeat songs though perhaps a little samey. Nice to see an all girl group, I feel they're a little underrepresented especially in lists like these although I'm not sure this is the best example of what they can do. I have few qualms with the album overall, it was okay to listen to, just not hugely exciting. 66/100

Some pretty good songs, Tiny Dancer and Indian Sunset being standouts, very strong vocals and songwriting throughout, wouldn't expect less from Elton John. Quite a nice listen. 76/100 Score edited 28/01/26

It's been a couple of days since I actually listened to this album but it was very enjoyable. The title track was almost certainly the best song but they were pretty good across the board. I don't tend to have a difficult time differentiatimg between 2,3 and 4 star albums but to separate 4 from 5 or 1 from 2 is always a little trickier. In this case I think this is a 4. 78/100

Why is Mr Johnny so sweaty. I can sum up most of the songs in this album quite quickly: "I was servin' time in prison, For shooting my pa, He was a nasty old fellow, But I do love my ma, And even though I did drugs, And served time in a gang, I think it's mighty unfair, A man like me oughtta hang" Very typical Johnny Cash. It was fine 60/100 Score edited 28/01/26

Haven't got a lot to say about it wasn't listening to it in a huge amount of detail. Decent. 64/100

A real mix here, the start and end were very good, I have heard about Kendrick's lyrical skill and it did shine through in some songs, this, as I've said in other reviews, being a genre were songwriting strength is very apparent. Sherane was a very good opener and most of the songs post m.A.A.d city were very enjoyable as well, Sing About Me, I'm Dying Of Thirst and Compton being some of the stronger songs. The spoken section in the sings really helped to build a picture of what it was like to grow up in the city and definitely added to the album's atmosphere, they were a nice addition. That being said a lot of the central section of the album was slightly lacking for me, the lyrics weren't as strong and the style of singing/rapping just didn't sound as good. Without meaning to sound too performative, I didn't like the objectification of women in a lot of these songs, I understand that's the nature of this style of music, and that perhaps Kendrick is showing 'the ways of the city' so to speak but it didn't sit right with me. It's difficult to give this a rating which describes the album as a whole as I did find it had its ups and downs. Overall a 3 seems the most fair, recognising that it had both good moments and less interesting ones. Perhaps someone more in line with this style of music can appreciate the album more than I. I skipped the remix versions at the end of the album, I'd heard the song. Hopefully didn't miss out on much. Also, someone get that man his Domino's. 64/100

This was alr, lots of guitar obviously, that's what Hendrix was known for. He was a favourite of my grandad but it didn't do loads for me, still decent. I was in and out the room on this one so I listened less consistently. 61/100

Its really easy to come out when listening to an album like this, one that'd alright but not too interesting. As such I can't give as in depth a review as I'd like. The first(?) song was kind of annoying but it picked up and the rest was mediocre. High two, low three territory. Trying to avoid giving everything threes. 58/100

I like most of David Bowie's music but I hadn't heard most of this before, Heroes being the only song I actually new. I enjoyed listening to this whilst studying, some good typical Bowie songs with enjoyable instrumental pieces at the end which may have been some of my favourite songs of the album. Not a five star album as it doesn't compare to Ziggy Stardust but still very good. 77/100