124
Albums Rated
3.3
Average Rating
11%
Complete
965 albums remaining
Rating Distribution
Rating Timeline
Taste Profile
1990
Favorite Decade
Rock
Favorite Genre
UK
Top Origin
Wordsmith
Rater Style ?
17
5-Star Albums
4
1-Star Albums
Breakdown
By Genre
Top Styles
By Decade
By Origin
Albums
You Love More Than Most
| Album | You | Global | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|
|
If You're Feeling Sinister
Belle & Sebastian
|
5 | 3.19 | +1.81 |
|
Achtung Baby
U2
|
5 | 3.3 | +1.7 |
|
Tommy
The Who
|
5 | 3.32 | +1.68 |
|
Juju
Siouxsie And The Banshees
|
5 | 3.33 | +1.67 |
|
The Downward Spiral
Nine Inch Nails
|
5 | 3.34 | +1.66 |
|
Hybrid Theory
Linkin Park
|
5 | 3.39 | +1.61 |
|
Stand!
Sly & The Family Stone
|
5 | 3.43 | +1.57 |
|
Dirt
Alice In Chains
|
5 | 3.46 | +1.54 |
|
Rio
Duran Duran
|
5 | 3.5 | +1.5 |
|
Gorillaz
Gorillaz
|
5 | 3.53 | +1.47 |
You Love Less Than Most
| Album | You | Global | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Paul's Boutique
Beastie Boys
|
1 | 3.46 | -2.46 |
|
Fromohio
fIREHOSE
|
1 | 2.88 | -1.88 |
|
BEYONCÉ
Beyoncé
|
1 | 2.86 | -1.86 |
|
Ys
Joanna Newsom
|
1 | 2.8 | -1.8 |
|
Birth Of The Cool
Miles Davis
|
2 | 3.63 | -1.63 |
|
Hounds Of Love
Kate Bush
|
2 | 3.62 | -1.62 |
|
Blonde On Blonde
Bob Dylan
|
2 | 3.48 | -1.48 |
|
Queen II
Queen
|
2 | 3.48 | -1.48 |
|
Frank
Amy Winehouse
|
2 | 3.46 | -1.46 |
|
Fleet Foxes
Fleet Foxes
|
2 | 3.43 | -1.43 |
5-Star Albums (17)
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Popular Reviews
Gorillaz · 1 likes
5/5
Liam Gallagher, Damon Albarn's sworn friend, called this record "music for twelve-year-olds." There's some truth to that — I'll never give this album a low rating, not least because it was the one my parents gave me for my ninth birthday, along with my first CD player.
And how wonderful that it still sounds great to me now! Albarn, no matter how you look at it, is a genius and a visionary; what else could you call the man who, in the early 2000s, decided to create a hodgepodge of rock, hip-hop, reggae, trip-hop, and Latin music? And then he added to it an entire story about a virtual band, drawn by Jamie Hewlett, that those same nine- and twelve-year-olds absolutely latched onto.
They still latched onto it perfectly today, and this Gorillaz-invented "storyline" band trope works just as well for modern bands (hello, Twenty One Pilots). Thanks to them for this!
Supergrass · 1 likes
3/5
If you need to explain Britpop to someone in simple terms, you don't need to. Just play this album, because Supergrass has captured everything the genre has to offer: both the good and the bad.
At the beginning of the record, you think you've been sold some Blur substitute, but things get more complicated later. The band not only utilizes the hallmarks of the genre at the time, but also draws on their homeland's past achievements: there's punchy mod rock à la The Who, punk (more like pop punk), a touch of psychedelia, a touch of funk, and melodic Beatlesque. By the end, everything completely goes wild, turning into some kind of drunk, rollicking cabaret — much like the one on the cover. There's even a Wonderwall equivalent here.
A hilarious, diverse album, but it still falls short of a four star mark.
Massive Attack · 1 likes
3/5
Unpopular opinion: this album may have been innovative when it was released, but it hasn't held up very well.
Yes, perhaps thirty-five years ago the mix of reggae, hip-hop, and soul sounded novel; overall, it still sounds good, but, firstly, many bands have emerged who are making this kind of music just as good, and in some places even better, and secondly, sometimes the songs drag on unnecessarily. The album's cohesion also suffers, and Del Naja has never hidden the fact that they simply recorded demos in the studio and then simply brought in guest vocalists. Ultimately, the music becomes mere background music.
It's a cult classic, but I don't find it appealing. Additional star for the rich bass lines, but overall it was a bit boring to listen to.
Lorde · 1 likes
3/5
Typical pop music of its era.
Jack Antonoff has cranked up the most generic production from ten years ago. If the song is slow, it's built on a kick drum that sounds like a pillow being hit, and a snare drum that sounds like a slap on the thigh. If the song is fast, you remember how fast pop songs sounded in 2015-2017, like you're attending an aerobics class.
And Lorde herself, for me, has always been a one-hit wonder, and she'll probably remain so — this album has a couple of earworms, then she'll go off into some other realm.
Blur · 1 likes
4/5
In 1994 Blur invented Britpop, and a year later Oasis turned it into music for a completely different audience — let's say, the English working class. Blur struggled a bit more with their next album, but ultimately realized there was nothing to be gained from it and moved on.
They arrived at the American indie sound. More precisely, they were introduced there by guitarist Graham Coxon, who had been listening to the music of Beck and Pavement. The label, journalists, and fans were shocked, but the album still took off. Blur proved that sometimes you need to change things up.
At the same time, the band openly mocked Americans at times, and "Song 2," which became a major hit in the US, was intended as a parody of grunge. In this regard, Blur still hold their own: they recently openly stated that their Coachella show was completely off-the-charts, as it's the only festival where audience members film themselves on their phones, not the stage. Well, they aren't wrong.
1-Star Albums (4)
All Ratings
Amy Winehouse
3/5
All the components of success are in place — a pleasant voice, reverences to old Motown releases in sound, the lyrics are mostly about love... At the same time, the album owes a considerable share of its popularity to the people who made the sound here, Mark Ronson and Salaam Remy; the songs from the former, in my opinion, came out more interesting. The audience and critics rated the record extremely highly, and overall it's not bad, but I don't understand this degree of enthusiasm, maybe it's just not for me.
Amy Winehouse
2/5
You can have different opinions about Back to Black, but at least it never gets boring; Frank is an hour long, and halfway through I was already tired of these repetitive homages to Sinatra. Another reason to consider that it was Ronson who made the second album a cult classic.
The Doors
3/5
Definitely not The Doors' worst album, but for me, not their best either. Jim Morrison's blues obsession in his later years likely led to the band's shift in sound on this album; in my opinion, they shouldn't have done that; that's not what made The Doors great. Some songs are downright boring, and The Black Keys' take on "Crawling King Snake" is a better choice (old ones, don't hold it against me).
However, the entire album is worth listening to, especially the last song, "Riders on the Storm." Simply magical. Ray Manzarek's keyboard solo, the sound of the waves... And Jim's strained vocals are very fitting here; he may have lived a sinful life, but he said goodbye beautifully.
Portishead
4/5
I'll say right away that this is a mood-based record, and now, with the black-and-white palette outside, is the perfect time to listen to it. It's hardly depressing, but melancholic, yes. Let's just say any of the songs would be suitable for the title theme of a James Bond film.
The entire album has a consistent tempo, the structure of each song is very similar, and surprisingly, it manages not to get boring. Occasionally, the jazz samples are diluted with sudden, but not at all unnecessary, hip-hop (or nu-metal, depending on your preference) DJ scratches. On the last song, these scratches are replaced by a lingering guitar riff. Beth Gibbons's voice, although not the strongest, is the icing on this melancholy cake.
Lorde
3/5
Typical pop music of its era.
Jack Antonoff has cranked up the most generic production from ten years ago. If the song is slow, it's built on a kick drum that sounds like a pillow being hit, and a snare drum that sounds like a slap on the thigh. If the song is fast, you remember how fast pop songs sounded in 2015-2017, like you're attending an aerobics class.
And Lorde herself, for me, has always been a one-hit wonder, and she'll probably remain so — this album has a couple of earworms, then she'll go off into some other realm.
The Police
4/5
Their second album was a springboard for them, and unlike the raw, punk-rock first, it emphasizes reggae (as reflected in the title). Sting, who hasn't yet fully developed his style, still vocally mimics Bob Marley, and the backbone of the music is, of course, Stewart Copland, whose energetic yet relaxed drums run like a skeleton throughout the record. It's a shame he's not quite as accomplished a songwriter, and the three fillers he contributed prevent me from giving the album the highest score.
Orange Juice
3/5
It's impossible to pinpoint the approximate year of the album's release based on the cover alone — it could have been 80s new wavers, 2000s indie rockers, or today's Pitchfork regulars. The same could be said about the music — it's a playful, synth-heavy blend of funk and post-punk in its more positive form. Something similar could have been played by Talking Heads, The Smiths, Blossoms, or Parcels — the boundaries are quite thin. Perhaps this desire to please everyone at once backfired on the band, as they didn't last long.
Nothing special, just a pleasant album that's good to listen to while doing something unobtrusive; sometimes that's more than enough.
Big Brother & The Holding Company
2/5
The best thing about this album is its bright and unusual cover. The same can't be said for the music; it's simply uninteresting.
No, for its time, everything sounds incredibly organic; I'm sure the recording process was like this: they went into the studio, got some joints, started jamming, eventually chose the best options, and off they went. That worked perfectly in California in the 1960s, but not anymore.
The main thing is I don't like Janis Joplin's vocals (who went on to a solo career after this album, but for obvious reasons, not for long). It feels like she's in two states: either she's screaming her head off, or she's talking like Marge Simpson. It's a matter of taste.
I understand why this album made the list, but I don't plan on listening to it again.
Rod Stewart
3/5
All I knew about Rod Stewart was that he had signature haircut, a plethora of flamboyant, bordering on tasteless, suits, and a couple of disco hits.
It turned out Stewart wasn't so simple. Firstly, he launched his solo career while still being in the Faces, under two contracts. Secondly, on this album, almost entire band plays with him, yet it was released as a solo album. And thirdly, in keeping with the fine tradition of the 60s and 70s, two-thirds of the album consists of covers of songs by other, already established artists. There's the secret to his success!
As for the sound, there's no hint of the disco that would follow a decade later — it's upbeat rock 'n' roll with an acoustic guitar and a bluesy edge. "Dylan-esque," I would have said, if the lyrics weren't mostly about past and current women. I don't really like Dylan, but this would offend him.
Peter Gabriel
4/5
When I was young, I thought a midlife crisis came when you started listening with pleasure to the solo projects of Genesis members. Well, here it is, apparently.
This is the first time I've listened to this album and Peter Gabriel's music in general properly; coincidentally, it's his most successful record. He'd been out of Genesis for ten years when it came out, so it's no surprise that almost nothing of the old, abstruse prog remains here. Instead, there's a wealth of varied percussion (primarily from southern countries), some funk motifs, a few ballads, and even a touch of ambient.
In the end, it sounds as if the less pretentious U2 were combined with the more upbeat Tears for Fears, topped off with the soundtrack to The Lion King. A very good album, and it was a pleasure to begin my acquaintance with this artist's work.
Dolly Parton
3/5
This album is the quintessence of old country. Nothing superfluous, everything is as it should be: acoustic guitar, the occasional violin, stories about the homeland and a man (loved or no longer loved), told in a singsong voice by beautiful female voices.
Genre-wise, this album wasn't even recorded by a supergroup, but a hypergroup. All the vocalists came from classic country backgrounds, but over time, they took different paths and became very famous along the way. They respected each other's music, which is why they decided to make a whole album together, paying tribute to their roots. It took them a long time, ten years with breaks, but they finally finished it.
This album is not for everyone; it might seem boring towards the end, but for me, those vocal harmonies gave me a sense of calm.
Beastie Boys
1/5
I have a good feeling about the band, but I've never listened to this album. It was the right decision, and I won't listen to it again.
Beastie Boys music generally has one purpose: to pump you up. This album fails. It's monotonous, repetitive, and feels like the guys are just yelling at you on the street for an hour. It sounds bad: the entire album, except for the vocals, is made up of samples, which is impressive, but it feels like the final recording was done on a tape recorder.
I read the reviews, and they praise the lyrics. Probably deservedly so, if you're American, but from my perspective, it seems like some kind of pedantic rant with a bunch of obscure references.
Who added this album to the list, and why? It doesn't even work as background music, and I don't understand who listens to it consciously. Very disappointed.
Miles Davis
2/5
Before listening, I decided to read a short biography of Miles Davis; it's certainly impressive. He lived a relatively short life, but managed to play with a large number of renowned musicians and, most importantly, became the founder of several jazz styles. This record is a collection of his works from 1949-1950, which later became the foundation of the subgenre known as cool jazz (hence the album's title).
The problem is that jazz gives you two options: either you're in the know, or it's completely out of your league. I'm going with the latter. The album is just over half an hour long, and it's all seemingly different, yet for me, it's all the same. It's not easy to listen to, and the slight feeling of being a bohemian in a 1950s American restaurant quickly becomes tiresome.
Star for the fact that the author became a colossus of the genre during his lifetime and remains one to this day, and a star for the fact that, overall, this album can be pleasant background music for work, cooking dinner, or even dinner itself.
Daft Punk
3/5
In the 1980s, disco music was considered (undeservedly) about as trashy as most songs of Billboard's top ten are today. The members of Daft Punk didn't think so, and based their first album largely on samples from the genre, as well as breakbeat, techno, indie rock—everything that was popular in the 1990s.
The problem is, it doesn't sound like a coherent album. Initially, the duo just wanted to release a few songs, but they found they had enough material for a double LP, so they decided to strike while the iron was hot. That's probably why for every catchy song they slapped on two long, repetitive ones. It's not such a big deal, though — after all, for the band, it was a trial run, literally "homework." They would release their best album four years later, but the authors of this book, for some unknown reason, decided to ignore it. You shouldn't do that.
5/5
In my opinion, David Bowie is the most overrated artist in the history of rock music. He's a talented and interesting musician, but critics (including the authors of this book, who included a third of his entire discography) are of the opinion that you should idolize him, otherwise you're a trash and don't understand anything about music.
But this album truly deserves to be added to the Bowie pantheon; it's his finest work. Everything works against the grain: there's nothing special here, the melodies are quite simple, and yet the overall mood is incredible — bright and energetic. The album seems conceptual, telling a unified story, but at the time the songs were written, it wasn't meant to be; they were simply arranged in the right order. It's still a great listen fifty years later, but when it came out, people must have been absolutely floored by it.
A classic, in short, worth listening to and re-listening to.
fIREHOSE
1/5
They say you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but sometimes you should judge an album by its cover.
This is the case. Completely unrelated, hastily stitched photographs on a sleeve, and the same goes for the music. Half an hour of sound, like a budding band rehearsing in a garage, with a bleating vocalist, an electric guitar strummed as if they'd never picked it up before, and two drum solos as separate tracks. This is probably how the Pixies would have played if everyone in the band had been on desomorphine.
This album wasn't included in the first edition of the book. Who later decided that I should listen to this album before I die? What is this person's life like now, how are they doing?
Ministry
3/5
Ministry is essentially a one-man band, led by Al Jourgensen. A fascinating man, he released his debut album, riding the wave of new wave and synth-pop popularity, but quickly realized he wasn't interested in this sugar-coated thing, changed labels amidst a scandal, and started doing something of his own.
This album is the quintessence of "his own," more energetic and angry. Ministry may not have invented industrial, but I'm sure Trent Reznor, Rob Zombie, and Rammstein, who clearly ripped off the riff for "Du Hast" from the second track, have all heard this album many times.
A good, rollercoaster-like release for fans of heavier music. If not for the somewhat monotonous and mediocre ending (two songs), it would easily have earned another star.
The Killers
5/5
Imagine a new band releasing a debut album where the entire first half is filled with such blistering hits that you can't even catch a breath? You don't even have to imagine it; the album is right there.
The second side isn't bad, but it certainly pales in comparison to the first. Nevertheless, its blend of post-punk, Britpop, neon synths, incredibly dense bass, and pleasant, if not particularly profound, lyrics made this album one of the pillars of 2000s indie rock.
Its main and only flaw is how good it is; twenty years later, The Killers still haven't quite managed to overcome this, and later they completely retreated into American Springsteen-esque territory. However, some other bands haven't achieved even half the awesomeness of this single album in their entire careers, so there's no point in complaining.
B.B. King
3/5
As they said in the film "Crossroads," "Blues is when a good man feels bad because he's thinking about the woman he once loved."
This album follows that thesis roughly halfway; the other half is full of upbeat, I'd even say downright danceable songs. B.B. King is a giant of the genre, no matter how you look at it, and here he shines. It doesn't matter that half the songs here aren't even his, they're so-called "blues standards." What matters is how he performs them for half an hour, practically without a break (remember, this is a recorded concert), how he improvises, and how the band understands these improvisations from the first note. The audience is wild in the background, which adds a bit more energy to the record.
A classic of the genre, I can't say the album has stuck in my head, but it was a pleasure to listen to.
Pere Ubu
3/5
Surely everyone has heard the so-called "new wave of post-punk"? Yes, yes, be it the now-hyped Geese, a slightly toned-down Black Country, New Road, or, at worst, Sorry. Many people like it, but for me, it almost always comes off as pompous and pretentious.
The most interesting thing is that a band I hadn't heard before, Pere Ubu, made similar music almost forty years ago. The same rather jagged guitars, the same abundance of unusual instruments and noises, the same declarations instead of singing.
What's even more interesting is that I rather liked this album! They're certainly overdoing it with the experimentalism in places, but for the most part, it's decent post-punk, very unusual for its time. True, sometimes you still can't tell if it's the music playing in your headphones or a snowplow humming outside your window; however, that's par for the course for the genre.
Nine Inch Nails
5/5
Trent Reznor seems to have spent his entire life experimenting with sound, and while Pretty Hate Machine was dominated by synthesizers and Broken by aggressive guitar sounds, this album incorporates the best of both.
It's almost an hour of industrial history from a furious lyrical protagonist who hates everything around him, and especially himself, ultimately ending his own life. The lyrics delve into those corners of the brain and soul that you'd rather not think about, and the music sometimes forces you to vent your anger with its thunderous sound, and sometimes simply frightens you; this is aided by periodic rustling, screams, creaks, and other seemingly otherworldly sounds.
But there's nothing otherworldly here; this album was written by a living person, based on his feelings, and that fact sends a chill down your spine. I would strongly advise against listening to it in an unstable emotional state.
Talking Heads
4/5
New wave, art rock, funk rock, post-punk, dance rock, afrofunk, worldbeat, psychedelic funk... "Is such a plethora of genres really necessary to desribe this album?" you might ask.
Yes, and yes again! That's the magic of this work; its music is all of these things at once. African drums mix with funky bass, typical post-punk guitar lines are superimposed over danceable disco rhythms... Remove even one of these elements, and the entire album would crumble, but precisely because Talking Heads decided to combine the incompatible, it not only sounds coherent, but is considered by many to be their best work.
I'll still deduct one point — despite the maximum energy of the first half, some songs could have been shortened a bit; it feels like you're stuck in an endless loop. And Brian Eno wouldn't be himself if he didn't shove some semi-ambient stuff at the end. Otherwise, I recommend it!
Air
4/5
I listened to this album for the first time. I'd previously avoided it because, for some unknown reason, I thought it was elevator music.
I know, I know — incredible ignorance. This is more suitable for a stroll through a dimly lit park at night, enjoying a sunset by the sea, a slow dance with your girlfriend, the backdrop to an old French film, or, ultimately, a theoretical moon safari. And I wouldn't mind a leisurely ride to the seventieth floor in a panoramic elevator to this album. French electronic music: minimalist and rich, psychedelic and soothing, vintage and futuristic all at once.
If I could describe this album in one word, I'd say "elegant." An elegant album, not for everyday listening or for every mood.
Big Star
3/5
You'd think a ship would sail as it's named, and an album with that name from a band with that name would be familiar to many. Had you heard anything about it before? Personally, I hadn't.
But it turned out to be a positive rock record, clearly inspired by The Beatles and the entire British wave of the sixties. Indeed, had it been released five years earlier, it would have been received with a bang. It would have been equally well received had it been released ten years later, when R.E.M. and U2 were gaining momentum — it would have fit right in with them, too. In the early seventies, however, no one really wanted that kind of music, and the album's release went virtually unnoticed.
It's a pleasant release, well-preserved to this day, well-recorded (I especially liked the acoustic parts). All the songs on it are good, but that's about it — none of them offer anything particularly groundbreaking.
Fleet Foxes
2/5
For some reason, I've always confused this band with The War On Drugs, even though musically they have virtually no connection. Probably because I just find both bands boring.
Here's their self-titled debut album, which journalists raved about — and there you have it, an 87 on Metacritic is no joke. It's less than forty minutes long, but those forty minutes felt like over an hour to me. Perhaps it's because all the songs follow the same pattern — acoustic guitar, bass drum, and drawn-out, church-like chants. The cover art also conveys this mood; listening to it makes you feel like a lumberjack living in the 16th century.
Mumford & Sons, if they were dull, basically. It's probably a decent release, just not my thing.
The Doors
5/5
Personally, I feel a sense of calm when listening to this record, primarily due to the combination of Ray Manzarek's psychedelic organ and Jim Morrison's hypnotic vocals. However, it was only after learning a few details about it that I discovered its true greatness.
For example, the band never had a studio bassist; Manzarek played the bass part as a second line — a masterful feat. Furthermore, the album was recorded in just a few days, with most of the songs recorded in one take. And most importantly, the engineer's wisdom — he barely touched the final recording — made it sound as if the band were performing live. This is the main strength of this music, and I hadn't yet fully grasped the apparently metaphor-filled lyrics.
The Doors' best album and, arguably, one of the best debut albums ever.
Pentangle
3/5
"All the instruments played on this album are acoustic" — that's the proudly stated phrase on the album cover.
There's certainly something to brag about: in addition to the standard folk acoustic guitar and tambourine, there's also double bass, banjo, orchestral bells, bongos, and even an Indian sitar. Unusual instruments create unusual music, and in addition to the genre's classic motifs, collectively known as "medieval tavern," there's also something reminiscent of a mass, and a sense of improvisation, where each instrument seems to be playing its own part, yet the result is beautiful.
An interesting album, somewhat ahead of its time.
Isaac Hayes
3/5
While listening to this album, the question "Where do I know that voice from?" kept running through my head. I Googled the artist's name — and lo and behold, it's Chef from South Park!
However, Chef would be thirty years away, but for now, let's consider the fact that this forty-five-minute record consists of only four songs. At that length, it might seem like prog rock, but no, it's soul, albeit a rather unusual one. Moreover, two songs on this album (that's half of it) are covers, which Hayes managed to stretch out two or three times longer, yet they never get boring or lose their appeal: this is beautiful, somewhat pompous music, perfect for a candlelit dinner.
The record is almost sixty years old, but it doesn't feel that old at all; it's hard to believe it was recorded that long ago. I think that's one of the hallmarks of quality.
David Bowie
3/5
David Bowie died on January 10th, two days after the release of Blackstar. And I believe the fact that it's his swan song is the only reason it's even on this list.
I can just imagine the editors thinking, "We've added eight Bowie albums to the book, so how can we not include the last one?" There's nothing wrong with that, but it's important to keep this in mind — personally, I found almost nothing I liked about Bowie here. The album is too experimental, even for him; the saxophone wafts through almost every song, and if you add some distortion to some of the tracks, you'd almost sound like Lightning Bolt.
But what really gets you through the album is that you can hear Bowie's weight in his vocals, how he knows he doesn't have much time left in this world. I didn't really experience anything special while listening, but I can't give it a lower rating.
Massive Attack
3/5
Unpopular opinion: this album may have been innovative when it was released, but it hasn't held up very well.
Yes, perhaps thirty-five years ago the mix of reggae, hip-hop, and soul sounded novel; overall, it still sounds good, but, firstly, many bands have emerged who are making this kind of music just as good, and in some places even better, and secondly, sometimes the songs drag on unnecessarily. The album's cohesion also suffers, and Del Naja has never hidden the fact that they simply recorded demos in the studio and then simply brought in guest vocalists. Ultimately, the music becomes mere background music.
It's a cult classic, but I don't find it appealing. Additional star for the rich bass lines, but overall it was a bit boring to listen to.
The Beta Band
2/5
In the movie High Fidelity the main character puts on a (different) The Beta Band album in a record store and says, "I'm going to sell five copies." It's immediately obvious that the film is fictional — I doubt anyone in real life would buy the album after seeing something like that.
Similar artists include Beck and The Flaming Lips; they're right on target: it's lo-fi electronica with occasional guitars, a bit monotonous in some ways. I don't know how else to describe this music, but I can say that after this album's release, the band was booked as opener for Radiohead tour, which might give some insight.
A very uneven record. Sometimes it sounds pleasant, sometimes it's so dull that you want to turn it off. At first, I wanted to give it three stars, but then I remembered the book's title and thought, "Did I really need to listen to this album before I die? Naah..."
GZA
2/5
I have a positive attitude toward the Wu-Tang Clan and all its members and understand their contribution to the genre, but I'll admit without hesitation that I don't like most of hip-hop for a very simple reason.
What's the most important thing in hip-hop? Lyrics, of course. For me, lyrics have always been secondary, and here, as not a native speaker, even knowing the language, it's really hard for me to evaluate the author's intent — I still don't understand a bunch of references, even though the lyrics were right there on my phone screen while I was listening. On the other hand, music as such is minimal in hip-hop: it's just background music, a sample taken and then looped throughout the song. If you don't focus on the lyrics, it gets boring very quickly.
So, for hip-hop, I have one criterion: rocking / not rocking (there are exceptions, of course). Does this album rock? Well, it rocks, but it definitely won't rock for fifty minutes.
David Bowie
4/5
When I saw I was supposed to listen to this album today, I automatically thought, "Well, here's another Bowie album, added to the list simply because of the author's name; we've been there, we know."
When an artist releases an album forty years after their peak, you don't expect much from them: they're supposed to be doing something to keep from becoming completely ossified. Well, that one is a completely different story! It features the glam that made Bowie famous, funk rock, and even slightly heavier alternative, all elegantly crafted, perfectly in keeping with the artist's style, his signature feel. Add to that the fact that this was Bowie's first album in ten years; I can imagine the shock of those who also thought it was just another record from the veteran, and the impression it had on the younger generation, who had barely heard of him before.
A great comeback and a simply great album that still sounds very fresh. Pleasantly surprised!
Gillian Welch
3/5
Alternative country... The question immediately arises: "Alternative to what?" Well, probably to traditional country. "And what is the alternative?" It's a bit more complicated.
It's well known that the main themes of classic country are homeland, love, family, work. Alternative country is about the same thing, but with a touch of negativity, depression... Emo-country, basically.
This album could be called just that: emo-country. Songs in which Gillian Welch expresses her feelings in a slightly dark manner — love, longing for the past, admiration for Elvis. Nothing superfluous, just her pleasant voice and acoustic guitar — these are more like poems than songs.
Boring? Perhaps, the fifteen-minute last song alone is worth it. Will I listen to this album again? Probably not. Did I like it? Yes, I did. If your soul is yearning for something calm and acoustic, give it a chance.
Traffic
3/5
The album cover already hints at the kind of music we're in for — pretentiously but rather stylishly dressed, the moustachioed, hairy guys immediately suggest classic rock from the late 1960s. When you learn that the hairy guys are English, their sound is completely shaped in your head.
In fact, the album isn't quite that simple. It begins with a decidedly un-British "southern" rock sound, then gradually transitions into psychedelia, all the while maintaining its acoustic core. This is where they stumbled, overcomplicating things.
In some songs, you get the feeling that each member is trying to steal the show, trying to make their part the focal point; as a result, the ear doesn't know what to listen to. When you learn that half the songs were written by the guitarist and the other half by the keyboardist, the reasons for this discrepancy become clear.
It's a decent record, a pleasure to listen to, but the musicians didn't realize their full potential.
Al Green
3/5
When I saw the cover, I initially thought it was Khalid. He does look alike, especially from a distance, though his cheeks are a bit bigger.
But the music turned out to be completely different — classic Southern soul with a sweeping tempo that makes you want to stroll down a sunny street, chest out, and an abundance of brass instruments. The lyrics are mostly about the opposite sex, in keeping with the genre's traditions. Returning to contemporary artists: while Khalid took Al Green's hair and left it at that, Justin Timberlake and Seal have clearly drawn heavily from his music.
It's a pleasant album, but I can't give it more than three stars because the soul music is a bit monotonous and background for me. If you feel differently, you can give it an extra star or two.
Flamin' Groovies
3/5
From the very first song, you can tell that Flamin' Groovies loves old blues and The Rolling Stones, who adapted it for their time. Mick Jagger himself is said to have praised this album after hearing it, even saying it was more interesting than Sticky Fingers, released the same year.
It really turned out well, blending blues-rock with a dirty garage sound, similar to that of The Stooges. Unfortunately, in the band's native California this kind of music proved unpopular, the singer left, and the band refocused on British power pop, but that's another story.
Jagger's praise impressed the band so much that in the reissue of the album, which is now available on all streaming services, they added a whole second part of covers of rock 'n' roll classics. You can listen to that part, but it's not necessary.
Bill Callahan
3/5
I have no idea who Bill Callahan is, even though he's been in the industry for almost forty years, but on this album, at least, he reminded me of both Leonard Cohen and The National. The former has a "reading a poem to music" style, while the latter features rich arrangements featuring strings and keyboards. The mood of the songs is sometimes light, sometimes dark, and sometimes the lyrics are dissonant with the music; everything is in keeping with the genre's canons.
It's a decent, laid-back album, but I won't be adding it to my library. Perhaps to truly resonate with this kind of music, you have to live in the American Midwest, although it was pleasant to listen to even with a snow globe outside.
The Mamas & The Papas
4/5
"Santa-Barbara" by The Mamas & The Papas is certainly impressive. A quartet, two members of which are husband and wife, and the wife sleeps with the third member, who is in love with the fourth singer. Fleetwood Mac, if not envious, will certainly sigh with understanding.
But all will be revealed only after the recording of this debut album, which is very good. Sunny, positive folk rock, sung by four different but perfectly complementary voices. The quintessential sound of the sixties, it's no surprise that Tarantino used one of the songs for his "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood."
And, of course, the cover, the toilet on which horrified major US retailers who refused to stock the album. Band had to urgently cover it with an advertising sticker, and later they removed even the bathtub. And you say: "Arabs paint over women in albums"...
Blur
4/5
Looking back, it seems like every Blur album has always been a cult classic, but in the early '90s, few thought so. I'll go further, "thanks" to their first two albums, the band managed to make a tidy fortune and live practically hand-to-mouth for a while.
Perhaps when you're angry and hungry and have nothing left to lose, things like "Parklife" are born. It's a genre-defining record, without exaggeration, that, while it didn't feature any fundamentally new moves, executed them in such an order and proportion that it gave birth to Britpop. There's a little bit of everything here — ballads, punk rock thrillers, electronic dance hits, and even some orchestral pieces, sometimes serious, sometimes silly.
I once saw someone say that Blur was a band that planned to sound like The Kinks, but ended up sounding like The Jam. There is something to this.
Syd Barrett
2/5
Many respect Syd Barrett as the founder of Pink Floyd and one of the pioneers of psychedelic music in general. Even more are grateful that he left Pink Floyd soon afterward; this is understandable.
Barrett spent almost two years making his first solo album, and not because it was technically complex — far from it. On the contrary, almost the entire album is built on the most sloppy acoustic guitar strumming and singing (if you can call it that) over it. Sometimes session musicians, completely clueless about how and what was supposed to be played, would overdub these parts. In the end, Syd's wildness scared off two producers, and Gilmour and Waters, who had worked with him in his previous band, had to be called in to finish the recording.
All in all, it's certainly listenable, but it sounds like the ravings of a madman, which, by all appearances, is precisely what it is.
Mike Ladd
3/5
You can often tell an album by its cover. For example, what do we see here? A view from below of a roadside pole entangled in a multitude of wires. When a wire fails, they simply throw in a new one. Anyone who's been to Asia has witnessed this scene firsthand many times.
But the thing is, in Asia itself, I quickly stop noticing these wires, even though these "nests" are practically everywhere — my eye gets numb and takes them for granted.
That's the same with this album — its sound evokes the synthetic future of a sci-fi dystopia. The hip-hop here, like that pole, is woven with bits of post-rock and jazz, yet everything sounds uncluttered and even minimalist. It would be perfect as a soundtrack for, say, Mirror's Edge.
It's surprising that this little-known record appeared in the first edition of the book and is still there. It's probably worth a listen.
Blur
4/5
In 1994 Blur invented Britpop, and a year later Oasis turned it into music for a completely different audience — let's say, the English working class. Blur struggled a bit more with their next album, but ultimately realized there was nothing to be gained from it and moved on.
They arrived at the American indie sound. More precisely, they were introduced there by guitarist Graham Coxon, who had been listening to the music of Beck and Pavement. The label, journalists, and fans were shocked, but the album still took off. Blur proved that sometimes you need to change things up.
At the same time, the band openly mocked Americans at times, and "Song 2," which became a major hit in the US, was intended as a parody of grunge. In this regard, Blur still hold their own: they recently openly stated that their Coachella show was completely off-the-charts, as it's the only festival where audience members film themselves on their phones, not the stage. Well, they aren't wrong.
Frank Sinatra
3/5
Now, it would seem, a true legend! Who hasn't heard of Frank Sinatra? Everyone's mind immediately conjures up images of him in his signature trilby hat at the mention of his name. However, even here, things aren't so simple.
Yes, this is a pleasant collection of upbeat love songs written by other songwriters and by then almost classics, performed by Sinatra's velvety voice, unmistakable. Arranger Nelson Riddle also did a superb job with the instrumental section. But just remember, if you've heard one song on this album, you've heard them all; even AC/DC would be outdone in terms of monotony.
However, there's nothing wrong with that, and the record is perfect as a leisurely backdrop for dinner. Then you can smoothly go from dinner to dancing, if you have someone to join you.
The Avalanches
4/5
Sampling is a delicate matter; make a single mistake and you'll have to hand over all the profits from your song to other guys. Richard Ashcroft, Vanilla Ice, and the late Juice Wrld will tell you that.
If there's just one sample on an album, negotiating its use isn't a problem. But what if there are, say, nine hundred? Or even more than three thousand? That's exactly the number used on this record, according to its creators. Moreover, there are no new sounds here; it's all samples.
A horse's neighing, some Indian melody, something Rasta-esque, dialogue from a movie... The description sounds like cacophony, but in reality, The Avalanches managed to make a truly amazing dance album. Cutting it all up in the right order and getting permission to use the sounds is an incredible amount of work.
If you're too lazy to prepare a playlist for a party, feel free to just put this album on — everyone will appreciate it.
Devendra Banhart
3/5
Thurston Moore and Michael Gira gave Devendra Banhart his start in big-time music. With such "godfathers," you'd expect everything here to sound, shall we say, noisy.
In reality, this is a beautiful acoustic album. Short guitar sketches are close to both psychedelic America and the folksy England of the 1960s, and surprisingly, just as far removed. There's also a certain southern sound — Banhart lived in Venezuela until he was fourteen. And overall, he's something of a citizen of the world: not only did his parents name him on the advice of an Indian guru, but he also has the middle name Obi. Yes, after Obi-Wan Kenobi. With a biography like that, you can't write "flat" music.
Critics have compared Devendra to early Marc Bolan. I agree with them on some aspects of the guitar sound, but his vocal style is very much an acquired taste — it sounds a bit like alt-J. Keep that in mind; you'll either love it or your ears will wilt.
Neil Young
3/5
Neil Young is one of those artists whose cult status on the west I don't understand at all.
These days, he mostly grumbles about everything: Spotify (where he once managed to delete his entire discography), social media, Americans who voted incorrectly... Okay, old man yells at cloud, but what did he do in his youth, at his peak? He played pretty standard country-folk, which, while not bad musically, relies heavily on the lyrics, which dramatically raises the barrier to entry for me.
The lyrics, by the way, are so full of negativity and melancholy that Neil Young himself later decided he'd overreacted and didn't allow the album to be released on CD until 2003. He wouldn't let it be released, and he pulled the music from streaming services... Grandpa, do you even want people to listen to your songs or not?
As they used to say at university: "You're great, of course, but I wouldn't give you anything higher than a C."
Siouxsie And The Banshees
5/5
Despite several Siouxsie and the Banshees songs in my favorites, I listened to this album for the first time — and it was a success.
The entire record jumps between energetic punk rock and calmer post-punk, yet you're never free of tension throughout the songs. This dark atmosphere is primarily supported by the vocals and guitar. We'd later hear sharp, slightly jagged riffs in the works of Johnny Marr, Dave Navarro, and John Frusciante, but it was John McGeouch who first dabbled in them.
Siouxsie Sioux's voice will be familiar to fans of Florence + the Machine. Siouxsie's image, however, is the complete opposite — it's exactly what every '80s alt-girl wanted to be, and Tim Burton clearly modeled Lydia from Beetlejuice on her.
It's rare that a studio album can rival a greatest hits collection in terms of density. A very pleasant surprise and a record that is truly worth to hear before you die!
Johnny Cash
3/5
Johnny Cash loved performing in prisons, despite never having served time.
Cash's most iconic performance is considered to be his concert at Folsom Prison, released a year earlier. He hadn't originally planned to record this show, but an English crew filming a documentary about prison life came to film it. The label accepted the bonus, and they were right – thanks to the San Quentin concert, Cash was nominated for three Grammys, one of which he won.
The cover photo of the artist became one of his signature images, but this album gave us (and the owners of bootleg merch stands) an even more iconic shot, where Johnny clearly expresses his feelings about the cameramen (https://www.nme.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/SnapGalleries180311.jpg) blocking the prisoners' view of the stage.
A fine record, one of the pillars of country music. But whether a list of essential albums really needs two Johnny Cash prison concerts is an open question.
Radiohead
3/5
An opinion that will incur the wrath of Pitchfork magazine readers and others alike: Radiohead as a band ended with OK Computer.
Then Radiohead as an art object began, because, in my opinion, almost all of their subsequent work can be described with the phrase "experiments for the sake of experiments," and that began with this album. Guitars are minimal here (quite unexpectedly after the previous album), but there's an abundance of ambient, IDM, techno, and other "smart" electronica, sometimes bordering on white noise. Overall, the album can be roughly divided into two parts: music for a German club and music for floating. The faces of everyone who expected the band to cement their status as the new kings of intellectual rock here are beyond imagination.
Many critics may consider Kid A practically the most important album of the 2000s, but I'd rather listen to The Bends several times over.
Lynyrd Skynyrd
5/5
By now this site gave me the pleasure of listening to excellent debut albums by The Killers and The Doors, but the opening from Lynyrd Skynyrd is something else entirely.
The record is steeped in the spirit of the American South, instantly making you want to listen to it while driving a muscle car with a Confederate flag flying out the window. It's hard to pick a single song; every single one is worth its weight in gold. The brisk opening with I Ain't the One, the keyboard solo in Tuesday's Gone, the lyrics in Simple Man... But the epochal Free Bird, with its four-minute guitar solo, is still unrivaled.
The band's star would set as quickly as it had risen: four years later, a plane crash would take the lives of frontman Ronnie Van Zant, two other musicians and their manager, and leave the remaining members physically and emotionally scarred. Lynyrd Skynyrd is now the Ship of Theseus; none of the original lineup remains. However, the artists' decision is clear: these great songs must live on.
Peter Frampton
3/5
Is Peter Frampton's name familiar to many? If not, don't be embarrassed. There's a reason for that — his first four albums weren't exactly stellar, enjoying neither critical nor popular success.
But then something magical happened: his live album, featuring the same songs performed, was released and hit the jackpot. Critics praised it, radio stations played it, and most importantly, it sold incredibly well and remains one of the most popular live albums in history. The artist has never been able to replicate this triumph.
It remains a magic until you compare the studio and live versions of the songs head-to-head. The songs remain fairly average, but as flat and trivial as they sound on the recordings, they are just as energetic and expansive in concert (the sound of his signature talk-box helps in some places).
This is where the stage truly became a place of power for the artist.
Fela Kuti
3/5
Fela Kuti is known as the father of Afrobeat, a genre that blends jazz, funk, and African folk rhythms. The genre is generally quite enjoyable, both for dancing and as a background track; this album is no exception, but the story behind its creation reads like an episode of "Parts Unknown".
Kuti declared his own microstate in Nigeria, consisting of a commune and a recording studio. The government became agitated and told him to stop acting up. Kuti got angry and recorded this album, which consists of just two songs (a reissue is available online, adding two more). In my opinion, the lyrics are simple and rather toothless, but the government was overly receptive to this ragebait and sent the army to burn down the rebel's house. During the process, the soldiers beat the artist and threw his mother out of a window, killing her. Kuti responded by sending the coffin containing his mother's body to the then-president's residence.
Basically, this scene (https://youtu.be/UajTvU3sjrY) from "The Boondocks" perfectly describes the whole situation.
Yes
4/5
If any of you were planning to get into progressive rock, Yes's Fragile is practically the perfect choice.
This album is easy to listen to and not overly complicated. It sounds beautiful, if a bit heavy in places. However, if you start to analyze it in more detail, you realize that none of the parts are easy to play, and yet the musicians have managed to juxtapose them without degenerating into cacophony.
Are there any downsides? Of course there are. Of the nine songs on the album, only four are full-length; the rest are short vignettes from each musician, a sort of "talent showcase". Here's a keyboardist arranging a piece from Brahms. Here's a short drum fill. Here's an acoustic guitar number with a medieval sound, and so on... They're all skilled guys, they've proven themselves, there's no denying it, but these performances could have been reserved for live performances only.
What else can I say?
⬅️To Be Continued
Neil Young & Crazy Horse
4/5
This Neil Young is much closer to me than On the Beach, which I got here last time!
The album is very unusual. Firstly, it's unclear whether it's a live album or a studio one — almost all the songs were recorded live (crowd noise was muted, but it still comes through in places), but the songs are new, previously unreleased. Secondly, it's clearly divided into two sides. Side one is just classic Neil Young, with his acoustic guitar and harmonica. This section is fine, but the album really kicks into high gear on side two, where Neil is joined by his band. There's such a noise here, and the guitars are loaded with so much distortion, that it immediately becomes clear why Nirvana and Pearl Jam admired Young.
The decision to loop the album was also a brilliant move — the first and last songs are essentially the same, but the sound and verse order are changed.
In general, Neil hasn’t gotten rusty by his twelfth album!
Holger Czukay
2/5
In the mid-1950s, French avant-garde artists developed a new movement called "musique concrète." "Concrete" here involves recording absolutely any sounds (from a creaking door to the sound of rain) and then sampling them (if such a term existed back then).
Holger Czukay was inspired by this school when writing his first solo album. The cover likely shows him at work — in addition to natural sounds, he also used excerpts of dialogue from television and radio broadcasts. All of this was layered over some decent bass lines (Czukay played bass in the band Can) and spiced up with his quiet vocals.
And overall, it's not all bad; the album could serve as a background. I was about to give it three stars until I listened to the last song, where all this variety of sounds began to merge into a cacophony. Even this could have been forgiven if the song hadn't been fifteen minutes long.
David Bowie
4/5
By the end of 1974, David Bowie had grown tired of the Ziggy Stardust image he'd created (knowing the artist's love of change, he held on for a long time), and then, during a US tour, a fortunate stop in Philadelphia, where soul music reigned supreme, came up. "This is what I'll make my next album like," the maestro decided.
He did. My feelings after listening to it are mixed. I'm not really into soul music in general, and this one feels strange somehow; even Bowie himself called it "plastic." The Beatles cover here is perhaps one of the most disgusting I've heard. Half the album is practically filler (though that's often the case with Bowie).
On the other hand, it's not bad as a backdrop to a party, and there are a couple of strong hits.
And it turns out that a three is not enough, and a four is too much... But for the smart move to put the two best songs first and last, so that the album starts off strong and leaves a good aftertaste, I give it a higher mark!
Steve Earle
3/5
By industry standards, Steve Earle took a long time to get going — despite his extensive songwriting career, he released his debut album at age thirty-one.
Perhaps it's for the better — he had more life experience to write these songs: he'd played bass in a local band, did some blue collar jobs, and married three times.
The result is a record at the intersection of country and heartland rock, a classic example of both genres. The music is fairly simple, the lyrics describe the everyday life of an average American worker from the South, life on the road, the prospects (or rather, the lack thereof) of small towns, and personal relationships. Bruce Springsteen, to whom Steve has often been compared, did something similar on a larger scale; to me, he reminded of a less produced Bryan Adams.
A pleasant album for a short drive.
White Denim
3/5
While King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard were just warming up, White Denim were already in full swing!
Honestly, it's surprising they didn't experience the same wave of popularity — their music is very similar in places. Perhaps the reason is it's the purely American school of jam rock, a genre known for its lengthy improvisations that aren't everyone's cup of tea.
The album, however, doesn't feature any overly long songs, but the spirit of, say, the Grateful Dead is fully present. It feels like at times they've mashed up all sorts of genres in a single song: a jazz guitar part transitions into a progressive riff, the drums suddenly leap into a high-speed psychedelic rock fill every now and then, and the bass seems to float through the entire album, sometimes diving deep, sometimes overshadowing everything else.
An interesting sense of madness, but madness with mathematical order.
Scott Walker
3/5
For anyone who logically assumed this was Scott Walker's fourth solo album, I hasten to disappoint you — it's his fifth. The oddities don't end there.
Listeners and critics of the late 1960s misunderstood the juxtaposition of a pop baritone with lush, cinematic orchestral arrangements and ignored the album to such an extent that the label decided not to reprint it (the first reissue wouldn't be released until 1992).
Yet the record still managed to reach the right audience, as echoes of its mysterious atmosphere can be felt in Pulp, Suede and Nick Cave, as well as in some works by Alex Turner and Brendon Urie.
Walker, however, continued to pursue increasingly avant-garde experiments right up until the very end, beating raw meat with a hammer and clanking machete blades during studio recordings, and even released a collaborative album with Sunn O))). However, that's another topic.
The Who
5/5
There are albums that are best listened to in their entirety, there are those that should be listened to in their entirety, and then there are those that must be listened to in their entirety.
Tommy falls into the latter category. One of the first (or second, depending on your perspective) rock operas, it was written almost entirely by the band's guitarist, Pete Townshend. It's a seventy-five-minute classic rock epic, where the songs, like chapters in a book, flow into each other almost seamlessly — from half-minute interludes to long overtures.
The plot isn't exactly easy to follow. It's clear that it's about a deaf, dumb and blind man who eventually becomes a religious guru, but the record benefited greatly from Townshend himself describing the entire ten-page script in an interview with Rolling Stone before its release.
The album's main drawback is that it could have been about fifteen minutes shorter. However, that's not a huge deal.
Paul Weller
4/5
In 2014, I went to a festival where Paul Weller performed. Out of habit, I decided to listen to some of his discography before the concert, and I didn't understand his music at all. I barely remember the concert either, so when I saw this album today, I automatically expected an hour of something lackluster.
But the album turned out to be very good! There's nothing here from Weller's native The Jam, of course, but it does have what I'd call "proto-Britpop" — melodic, often semi-acoustic songs imbued with the atmosphere of 1960s England, yet still freshly listenable today. Everything sounds calm, but not depressing; melancholic in places, but not oppressive. The record is superbly recorded and mixed; the hour flew by, even with a few instrumentals and occasional two-minute outros.
If you enjoy the Noel Gallagher side of Oasis, then Wild Wood is definitely worth checking out.
LCD Soundsystem
4/5
James Murphy, the driving force behind LCD Soundsystem, once told journalists, "Writing about us isn't hard... Just use words like 'unlikely frontman,' 'bear-like,' 'unshaven,' 'Talking Heads,' blah blah blah"
Indeed, looking at this disheveled man, the last thing you'd think is that he's a key figure in the indie sleaze movement, the 2000s' punk-electronic sound. Yet, it was his debut album that took New York dance floors by storm in 2005. On Sound of Silver, he further refined his style, while also making nods to Kraftwerk and, of course, Talking Heads.
This energetic music, which makes you want to run somewhere, is surprisingly combined with lyrics about relationships, thoughts on aging, and the melancholy of the big city — in fact, these are precisely the topics that conversation turns to when the sun breaks on the dance floor.
3/5
PJ Harvey's music has never been particularly close to me (so much so that I walked out of her last show in my city), so I listened to this album, considered by many to be her most important, in its entirety for the first time.
There was no fireworks display of emotion: it's simply solid alternative rock, sometimes measured, sometimes energetic. There are a couple of hits, and it was a pleasure to listen to. The main drawback is that when Polly switches to a high-pitched voice (let's be honest, it's almost a screech), you really want to turn the record off; fortunately, such moments are few and far between.
One journalist disagrees with me, however, and considers the album's only drawback the presence of Thom Yorke — on three songs! It's laughable until you try to imagine his vocals on the other tracks and catch yourself thinking the album sounds like early Radiohead. Let everyone decide for themselves whether that's a good thing or a bad thing.
Tito Puente
2/5
When I worked at a concert venue, we often hosted Latin American parties where girls looking pretty much like the one on this album cover would sway their hips, arms, and breasts for hours to songs like the ones I heard here. This record is perfect for that kind of entertainment.
It's hard to enjoy listening to it in any other setting. Firstly, every song sounds like the same thing — it's exactly what you imagine when you hear the phrase "Caribbean music". Secondly, you really can't imagine what to do with this music outside of dancing: maybe sipping Cuba Libre, but then again, I'd prefer to do that while lying under a palm tree, which isn't always within reach.
That said, it's all well-recorded, and Tito Puente is a recognized master of the genre, and his musicians are no slouch, but I quickly grew tired of the album. Perhaps I'll have to listen to it again during a beach vacation.
R.E.M.
4/5
R.E.M. is often compared to U2 in various music articles and on streaming services under the "Similar Artists" tab. I'm fine with U2, but this comparison is too flattering for the Irish.
R.E.M. is much more elegant; their lyrics occasionally include political messages, but they don't hit you so hard. Their early albums were somewhat chaotic, but on Green, their major-label debut, the band found their energetic yet melancholy sound. Around this time, R.E.M.'s concerts began selling out arenas, leading longtime fans to accuse the band of selling out; in my opinion, this is unfounded. It's just that their multi-layered lyrics and slightly enigmatic music have somehow resonated with many.
It was also here that guitarist Peter Buck first picked up the mandolin, which three years later would become the backbone of the band's biggest hit, but that album isn't on the list.
David Crosby
3/5
As they say, you're judged by your clothes, and in this case, by your cover... Oh dear, what are those nostrils against the sunset? It looks like a cross between a postcard from a resort and a still from the end of some Korean drama series.
But what's inside the album? Nearly forty minutes of beautiful acoustic music, in its own way, from David Crosby, best known for his supergroup Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Although everything here starts off relaxed, by the middle of the listen a melancholy feeling begins to overwhelm, and at the end, some kind of church hymn suddenly appears.
Old acquaintances Graham Nash and Neil Young also contributed to Crosby's work on this album; just as members of the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and Santana. All in all, the amount of smoke in the studio is understandable, and since this album took second place on the Vatican newspaper's list of the best releases, perhaps the Pope himself was getting high to it.
Tracy Chapman
4/5
In the late 1980s, synth-pop and hairy metal ruled the radio, so it's logical that many producers turned down Tracy Chapman's requests to record her quiet, semi-acoustic debut.
Whoever took on this venture struck it big – the singer's simple, soft folk ballads about love, dreams of a better life, and social issues resonated so deeply with people that the album remains one of the best-sellers of all time. It all sounds truly pleasant, though Tracy's vocals are a bit peculiar, and if you don't like them, you'll likely tire of them by the middle.
Yes, in places the lyrics contain completely naive, leftist messages, based on the juxtaposition of rich and poor and black and white. On the other hand, the artist was 24 years old when the album was released. At that age, you can still fight for all that's good against all that's bad.
Thundercat
3/5
One could, of course, begin a discussion of this album by listing the musicians Thundercat has worked with, but for me, such approaches immediately make me think, "The session member has decided to go solo, nothing interesting."
Let's just say that Thundercat is, first and foremost, a very skilled bassist, and in this regard, he truly shines here. Unfortunately, he's not as good a singer, and his falsetto becomes tiresome after the album's midpoint.
Most of the album is based on standard modern R&B, but occasionally a whole host of genres breaks through: prog, soft rock, jazz, hip-hop, not to mention the related funk and soul. It sounds like something abstruse, but it's actually easy to listen to. The variety of guests here matches the genres: from Kendrick Lamar and Wiz Khalifa to Pharrell and, surprisingly, Kenny Loggins.
But twenty-three songs, even though they are short, are still a bit too many.
Pantera
4/5
Pantera is a perfect example of the phrase "rags to riches." With just one release, four Texas rednecks transformed themselves from mediocre glam losers into cowboys from hell, energizing a crowd of hundreds of thousands at Moscow's Tushino Airfield like an atomic bomb. After that, there was no slowing down, so the band decided to record the heaviest album possible.
And they did! "The guitar should sound like a circular saw, the drums should pound your ears," said drummer Vinnie Paul. And that's exactly what happened, along with pulsating bass and Phil Anselmo's barking vocals. Every musician gave it their all; every song, be it the hurricane-force "Fucking Hostile," the measured "Walk," or the ballad "This Love," simultaneously feels like a punch in the face from the album cover and makes you want to give it to someone yourself.
Taking one star off because the record becomes rather monotonous toward the end. Such energy needs to be carefully measured.
Duran Duran
5/5
If I had to choose a synonym for the word "style" in music, it would definitely be Duran Duran.
Forty years later, their second album has only just begun to mature, and everything about it is still stylish: the cover art, the jagged riffs, the superb rhythm section (surprisingly, all three members with the last name Taylor are not related), the recognizable (though not the strongest) vocals, the videos filmed for the nascent MTV era... And what a saxophone solo in the song of the same name!
Listening to this record makes you want to put on your best suit, take a beautiful woman by the arm, stroll along the embankment at sunset with her, and end the evening in a nightclub... Which these songs would also be perfect for! It's rock, pop, disco, and new wave all at once — the album excels in every genre it explores.
And that's why Duran Duran is loved by so many different people - from Princess Diana to Jonathan Davis, and of course, me.
Earth, Wind & Fire
4/5
In 1975, the low-budget film "That's the Way of the World" was released. It predictably flopped at the box office and unexpectedly propelled Earth, Wind & Fire, the creators of the eponymous soundtrack, to the top of the charts.
The film, however, is completely unnecessary to understand this album: it's classic funk-soul, performed by nine members on a variety of instruments, including some quite exotic ones. It's also a story of hard work — Earth, Wind & Fire had previously released five unsuccessful albums, but they didn't give up and, with their characteristic joy, continued to move forward, and they were rewarded for it.
The album dips slightly midway through the album, when the obligatory "Ballads" section begins, but everything else is sound so technically well and sung so positively that a three-star rating would definitely be too low.
Scott Walker
3/5
The 1950s and 1960s were truly amazing: if you had a pleasant voice, you didn't have to write songs; just cover other people's hits, make money, and have fun.
That's how Scott Walker's second album works, too, with only a third of its songs composed by him. The remaining two-thirds are versions of hits by Belgian Jacques Brel and covers of other popular artists of the time, as well as soundtracks. However, almost every one of these songs, with their sometimes pompous, sometimes airy arrangements centered around a pop baritone, would fit right in with a romantic film.
Walker translated and covered Brel superbly, and his own work is also quite good here, but the rest is rather mournful. In any case, if you're interested in fantasizing about what would have happened if Nick Cave sang in The Last Shadow Puppets (and the lyrics are downright Cave-esque in places), this record is probably the closest in spirit.
The Rolling Stones
3/5
Oh, the trend of the times when an artist was simply a singing head, performing what others had written before them.
On this album, The Rolling Stones for the first time abandoned this vicious practice — all the songs here are written by the Jagger / Richards duo, with only the influence of old blues standards remaining, heavily diluted by sitar, marimba, and harmonica, unusual for the genre.
Did the band succeed? At first, it certainly did; the entire first half of the album, ending with the epochal jam "Going Home," is excellent. The second half stumbled and then completely lost its way; these aren't exactly bad songs, they're just boring, especially considering the band's current stature.
After listening to the album, the initial confusion over the fact that four tracks were cut from the American version dissipates; but they added Paint It Black - that's what I call an equal exchange.
The Smashing Pumpkins
5/5
The Smashing Pumpkins took a huge risk when they decided to release a double album, and I'm sure they didn't expect how much it would pay off.
This is the band's magnum opus, and the crown jewel of '90s alternative rock, a multi-genre masterpiece that ranges from tender piano and orchestral ballads to screeching grunge riffs, from Floyd-esque art rock to new wave drum machines. It's a tome filled with stories of love, life, death, self-discovery, growing up, and infinite sadness. On first listen, you'll never guess what awaits you on the album, and that's its strength, making these epochal two hours fly by.
I could go on and on about how magnificent this album is, but I recommend you don't waste your time reading it and just listen to it — it's the perfect introduction to the band.
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
3/5
My favorite column, "Good Albums with Weird Covers." What is this? Who approved this photo? Why does the artist look like he's stoned?
Okay, let's move on to the album's sound. It sounds like... the Rolling Stones, Sticky Fingers era. Seriously, half the songs are "Brown Sugar," the other half are "Can't You Hear Me Knocking." The playing and singing are all good, but there's a persistent feeling of something derivative.
That's probably why the album was such a hit in England, while in Tom's native USA, it remained largely unheard for another year. But then again, no prophet is accepted in his own country.
I really like Tom Petty. He's a great musician, and this is just the beginning of a long journey, during which he would go on to write his greatest hits with The Heartbreakers, solo, and as part of the supergroup The Traveling Wilburys. It's all the more surprising that this is his only album on this list.
Gary Numan
2/5
I'd heard, of course, that Gary Numan was practically the father of synth-pop and electronica, but I knew nothing of his work beyond his biggest hit, "Cars." So, when this record came up today, I was really curious to see what else the artist would have to offer.
Bottom line: you don't need to listen to the whole album; every song on it sounds like "Cars," only worse. The cold, robotic sound turns this music into pure background music for me. There's background pop for shopping at H&M, and this background electronica for a tour of some car factory (pun intended) or production facility. I don't understand how anyone can listen to it consciously now; obviously, in 1979, after all the blues and other psychedelia, this was a novelty, but now the album sounds like AI-slope.
Nevertheless, "Cars" is still a good song with a pleasant melody — it's the only thing that saves the album from a one-star rating. You need to be more humane!
Alice In Chains
5/5
Did everyone at school ever show a short film about the consequences of drug use? I propose a more innovative solution: students should simply listen the segment of this album from "Junkhead" to "Angry Chair," with lyrics and a biography of Layne Staley printed. If they're smart, they won't even think about drugs again.
Even though Alice in Chains is probably my least favorite of the grunge big four, this album is the quintessence of the genre. Slow, heavy, as if mired in the dirt, Jerry Cantrell's doom metal riffs overlaid with bluesy lyrics. The cover is also perfectly chosen: while listening, your consciousness seems to melt, hallucinating on your subcortex, as if you're in the middle of an endless desert.
An extremely dark and, at times, depressingly oppressive album — and, surprisingly, equally beautiful.
Isaac Hayes
2/5
The list of "1001 Albums..." was compiled by blessed people; otherwise, I can't explain the logic behind the fact that it doesn't include EPs or greatest hits collections, but does include live albums and, wait for it, soundtracks.
And while the Earth, Wind & Fire album I came across earlier, while technically a soundtrack, is perfectly listenable without the film, this double album by Isaac Hayes is just a complement to the events unfolding onscreen.
Not only is the album long, it's also almost entirely instrumental. Vocals are found on only three songs, one of which is Hayes's signature twenty-minute psycho-soul jam. It's all a bit of a challenge, and I generally don't understand how people listen to instrumental film music without the film itself (or why Hans Zimmer sells out his concerts).
It's not bad as a background, but as a position for such a list, it's a complete failure.
Pet Shop Boys
2/5
If you believe the saying "you judge an album by its cover" is true, then Pet Shop Boys have gone above and beyond on their fifth full-length. It's not evident on streaming services, but the original CD (https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4241/34963398184_9564852deb_o.jpg) was released in an all-orange case with a rubberized top adorned with embossed letters and "Lego-like" bumps.
And the first song here sets the tone for the next fifty minutes of good synth-fueled new wave. Alas, what we hear is monotonous gay-club electronica with a straight kick drum. While the duo's previous work sounded unusual and even luxurious, here the sound is extremely commercial and mainstream. It's unsurprising, albeit sad, that this album became Pet Shop Boys' best-selling and the only one to reach number one in the UK charts.
No, maybe I'm missing something, and the album sounded mega-innovative for its time. In that case, let it stay there.
David Bowie
3/5
The worst thing for an artist is reaching a status where "your record starts working for you": you can do anything, journalists will approve, and the public will go wild.
David Bowie also succumbed to this sin. While the first half of this album is short, somewhat understated, but still pleasant songs, typical of the glam-funk Bowie, the second half begins the "Experiments" section: oppressive ambient interspersed with throat singing in an invented language, sounding like the soundtrack not just to a film, but to a David Lynch film. As expected, Brian Eno "did a favor"; he'll still confuse many good artists with his gimmicks...
And yet, years later, the album is considered practically the peak of Bowie's creativity! Basically, Low is Kid A for boomers. Both decent albums, but would anyone have praised them so much if the artists' names weren't on the covers? Of course not.
Beck
3/5
Over the first ten years of his career, Beck tried his hand at everything. He made albums in the styles of country, lo-fi folk, funk, and even chamber pop, but on Guero, he returned to what made him famous: a mixture of all of the above.
And the album itself is decent, but somehow awkwardly disjointed. The upbeat opener, based on a sample from the Beastie Boys' "So What'cha Want," and the rhythmic toms of "Black Tambourine," are mixed with strange hip-hop about vegetable men in a vegetable van and country riffs played so poorly they could only have been done on purpose.
It might seem like the artist simply doesn't know what he wants — the record is as resourceful as it is tedious and hokey. Another thing is that, most likely, this is exactly what Beck wanted when he decided to release one more album as if it were assembled piece by piece, among which there are both gems and trash.
Joanna Newsom
1/5
Let's start with the fact that Joanna Newsom's discography isn't available on Spotify, as she considers the platform "cynical and musician-hating."
And for once, I can envy those who use Spotify, since God has spared them from this pretentious bleating over a cacophonous medley of classical instruments. You think you can't ruin a harp and a harpsichord? You can!
The artist talks, squeals, creaks, and chirps here, but it's hard to call it singing, and that's the first reason I want to turn the album off. The second is the length of the songs — there are only five, but each one averages ten minutes (it gets tough by the third).
Joanna Newsom is that artsy classmate who tries to write poetry, yet is convinced that it should be interesting to everyone, and whose voice you can't shut up about out of politeness.
The Only Ones
3/5
While punk rock had only just emerged in the mid-1970s, by the end of the decade it wasn't exactly dead, but artists had grown tired of its classic format and began trying to diversify the genre.
Sometimes this was completely unnecessary, as was the case with The Only Ones. Their debut album follows a clear rule: if a song is built on a few quickly played chords, it's not bad; if it's layered with prog, jazz, oriental music, or psychedelia, it becomes overloaded, like an Art Deco column stuck in the middle of an IKEA-decorated apartment.
But the weakest point here is the voice. It feels like the singer slept for an hour and a half before recording and was then dragged into the studio with a noose around his neck.
Objectively, the album doesn't reach a three stars mark, but I'll push it up, because for some reason I'm sure (although I can't prove it) that without this album there wouldn't have been the wonderful band called The Libertines.
Cyndi Lauper
4/5
Once again, the album cover says a lot about itself.
The sleeve features a barefoot Cyndi Lauper in a bright dress with an equally bright mullet, performing a strange dance against the backdrop of a closed, yet still bright, building. The music is an equally vibrant mix of genres: new-wave synthesizers, a synth-pop drum machine, and harsh, even punk-rock vocals.
It's no surprise that these songs resonated with American teenagers of the time. Instead of the standard two or three singles, the album was supported by six, the last of which was probably just for kicks, like, "Let's see if this one will really take off." Once five singles from one album entered the top five of the Hot 100, there was no time for jokes — only Michael Jackson had previously managed that.
I always knew this record had two big hits, but to my surprise, the rest of the songs weren't bad either. Eighties at their best!
AC/DC
3/5
"I'm sick to death of talking about how we've released 11 identical albums. In fact, we have released 12 completely identical albums." — said Angus Young. You can't argue with the maestro; all AC/DC music is about killer guitar solos and screeching vocals on one side, and schoolboy lyrics over a very standard rhythm section on the other.
So why did this formula only started to work for the band on their sixth album? I don't understand. They say the change of producer helped here — I wouldn't say so; the next album, Back In Black, is much more different from the older albums. Perhaps people were simply in a time in the late '70s when they wanted relaxed yet energizing music.
Nevertheless, the monotony hasn't gone away, and AC/DC's studio recordings quickly become boring. Their concerts and live albums are a different story! So if your soul is craving for some energy and fun, it’s better to turn on AC/DC Live – an album that, in its title itself, conveys the band’s clarity and straightforwardness.
Death In Vegas
4/5
Honestly, I wasn't feeling particularly energized the first time I listened to this album today, so I fell asleep during the first song...
But there's nothing surprising or bad about that! The opener here really does sound like some kind of lullaby, only a strange one — something gothic, some psychedelic, some trip-hop, but definitely dark. This electronic-guitar medley continues, though not bad, like a GIF of a truck driving toward a pole: the anxiety builds, but catharsis never quite arrives... Until "Aisha," where a screaming Iggy Pop tries on the role of a serial killer. After that, the tension eases, though I'd slightly rearrange the song order and put "Aladdin's Story" last.
If The Chemical Brothers had evil twins, they'd definitely be called Death in Vegas. Anyone who enjoys unconventional electronic music should pick this up.
Kate Bush
2/5
What Kate Bush and this album in particular deserves respect for is the arrangements. The sound of some of the songs is truly remarkable, and to produce an album yourself, record it in the studio you built yourself, is truly impressive. But everything else...
I think Hounds of Love appears on various "best of" lists more often than any other album. Can anyone explain why? It's certainly not because of the first side, which is almost entirely danceable new wave. So all the credit goes to the incredibly drawn-out, pseudo-philosophical second side, where ballads mingle with Irish motifs, and piano passages morph into industrial drum machine sounds? No, let the Pitchfork journalists listen to that.
I was thinking of adding a third star for "Running Up That Hill," but even that one was better with Placebo.
The Flaming Lips
3/5
The Flaming Lips are a very strange band, because the music they make was never meant to be mass-market. But by their tenth album, it had.
Listening to it, you get the feeling you've been floating inside some starship for almost fifty minutes, looking down at Earth from outer space. That's probably how ambient music is supposed to work, but ambient lulls me to sleep, and here it's just the right amount for enjoyment.
And the most incredible thing is that the foundation of this cosmic music is a completely ordinary, almost bardic acoustic guitar. It's responsible for the album's ringing sound, and the rest are just decorative add-ons: hip-hop beats and a touch of electronica.
It's a good, meditative, and beautiful record, but to avoid it feeling boring, you need to listen to it in a certain, slightly dreamy mood.
Paul Simon
3/5
80s rockers had a strange but common symptom of a midlife crisis: they began drawing inspiration for new songs from Africa.
Paul Simon even went so far as to dig so deep that he actually went to South Africa to record with local artists, prompting a howl from the leftist morality police, because of apartheid. This howl continues to this day, this time on the topic of "cultural appropriation" (which, by the way, doesn't exist), which doesn't prevent the album from being quite positive and danceable.
But what does Africa have to do with it? No, there are some of their folk music here, but it starts around the middle of the album and are expressed through bongos and folk chants. There's a much stronger influence of country, rockabilly, and classic rock 'n' roll here, and the African theme was explored long before this album's release by Talking Heads, and not long ago by Peter Gabriel. And they did a much better job.
Alanis Morissette
4/5
Record label executives have now realized that confessional songs "by girls for girls" are highly monetizable, and Gracie Abrams and Olivia Rodrigo have become a cloying tide. Surprisingly, this wasn't always the case.
Alanis Morissette made a deeply personal album, combining lyrics about friendship, betrayal, parental expectations, and the ability to find joy on an empty wallet with a mix of grunge, shoegaze, country, and drum machines, and no one wanted to release it. Madonna's recently founded label, Maverick, took a risk, and it paid off — many found a personal connection in these songs, and the album sold incredibly well.
Yes, some might find Alanis's voice offensive, and perhaps the album is heavily overproduced (as was the fashion in the 90s, trying to cram too much into the sound), but it was with this album that the artists began to talk about life with their listeners. And, of course, with the female listeners.
Violent Femmes
4/5
The first time I was stunned, when instead of the languid riffs I've heard the acoustic strumming, mistaking the band for the Australian grungers Violent Soho. The second time was when I heard lyrics sung in a nasal voice, the author of which would now be called an incel. The third, and most powerfully, was when I saw the year the album was released.
This is an incredibly visionary record. I don't think anyone before had thought of taking punk rock, a genre that's generally not the most overloaded, and stripping it bare of all its excess. What's left here is literally the skeleton — acoustic bass, acoustic guitar, and snare drum — and yet it all sounds much dirtier and more energetic than a distortion pedal.
Five years later, Pixies were using the band's work, ten years later, Weezer, fifteen years later, Bloodhound Gang. And forty years later, I discovered the album, and such discoveries were worth following this list.
Elvis Costello & The Attractions
4/5
Elvis Costello isn't really Elvis (or Costello), which makes it all the more surprising that he had the audacity to adopt the King of Rock 'n' Roll's name while he was still alive.
And after listening to this record, I can't say he did it undeservedly. Firstly, Costello is an excellent melodist; you start humming some of the songs after just one listen. Secondly, he has a superb backing band. Thirdly, the album simply sounds good; they mixed it expertly. Fourthly, even though Elvis has moved away from his earlier punk sound, some songs could still be mistaken for, say, The Clash. Fifthly, surprisingly, his voice is somewhat similar to Lenny Kravitz, who I personally enjoy listening to.
All in all, I can recommend it! But the elephants on the cover are completely out of place and don't convey the mood of the album.
The Human League
4/5
An album with a history that couldn't be further from the truth: before its demise, two co-founders left the band, and the third, vocalist Philip Oakey, decided to replace them with two schoolgirls.
It all smelled like a fiasco, but the result was an album featuring the band's greatest hits and, arguably, electronic standards for the just beginning 1980s. While The Human League had previously produced music in the vein of Gary Numan, here they simplified it a bit, thereby "revitalizing" it. The synthesizers are still neon, the drum machines are still as combative, and everything still sounds like music from the future, but something makes it more human and dreamy, sometimes dark, sometimes romantic.
The Vogue-style cover seems odd at first, but the more I look at it, the more I like it. And with the epic Don't You Want Me, surprisingly the last track on the album, the band has secured a permanent place in the electronic music pantheon.
10cc
3/5
Most albums try to be unified by a common theme or at least a similar sound, but not 10cc's second album.
It's hard for me to even generalize here; everything is so different, both musically and lyrically. A seven-minute piano ballad sits alongside a bongo-driven song about voodoo, and a seemingly serious guitar attack on Wall Street traders is followed by self-indulgent jabs at the level of "we're the worst band in the world, we've never done a days work in our life".
And yet, the melodies are complex, the rhythms are jagged, but it's hard to call it prog. However, it seems the band themselves wanted to craft their music in a more sophisticated way: the homophone of the album's title speaks for itself.
It's a very overloaded album, but I didn't get any negative emotions from listening to it, so it gets a light three.
MGMT
4/5
I caught myself listening to MGMT's debut album in its entirety for the first time. The impressions are mixed.
A triptych of "Time to Pretend," "Electric Feel," and "Kids" — an absolutely bulletproof, neon-dance-infused collection of singles that any young band would envy. The problem is, these are the main strongest points of album.
It's immediately obvious that the band is more drawn to 60s psychedelic rock, and MGMT aren't quite there: the result is either a strange, rhythmically tom-pounding primalism or downright boring acoustic hippie fare. The label also knew these songs weren't worth promoting the album with, and they didn't reach the masses. Instead, the band dug in their heels and made their next two albums in a similar style. The result is predictable.
But the singles are fantastic! How could I give anything less than a four stars?
Belle & Sebastian
5/5
Much to my surprise, I've listened to Belle and Sebastian's entire discography, but I don't remember it at all. Moreover, judging by last.fm, I listened to them before their festival performance I attended back in 2018, which I also don't remember! Given these memory gaps, it's logical to assume the band wasn't particularly interesting to me.
So, today I listened to their second album with a clean slate, and it was incredible. It's a virtually entirely acoustic record, the upbeat instrumentals of which almost always contrast with melancholic, sometimes even cynical, lyrics about ordinary people and their shortcomings.
I suppose something similar would have happened if you mixed The Kinks and The Smiths — two seemingly different eras, but that's precisely why the album still sounds fresh. It's a bit introverted and won't appeal to everyone, but for me, it reinvented the band.
Girls Against Boys
2/5
It feels like journalists lumped Girls Against Boys into indie rock simply because they didn't know where else to place them.
There are no upbeat or even slightly cheerful melodies typical of the genre here; the music is completely dark and icy, a feeling heightened by the sudden addition of two bassists. The vocals are muted to the point where you can hear something being sung, but you can't quite make out what it is. The riffs blend into each other during the transitions between songs and quickly become tiresome; I understand that during the grunge era, artists decided to make their music even messier, but this is too much.
It's not exactly a bad album; there have been worse ones, and a couple of songs even sparkle a little; but I'm sure it only made it into the book because one of the writers was an edgy "not an ordinary" schoolboy in the mid-nineties. If you want some high-quality, old-school post-hardcore, try Refused.
Johnny Cash
3/5
In the early 1990s, Johnny Cash, who was experiencing the decline of his career, was approached by Rick Rubin, the producer of many rap and rock artists of the era, to collaborate. Cash accepted, and the American series brought him back into the charts and into the public eye.
The fourth album in this series was the artist's last, and, as with Bowie's Blackstar, it's palpable: Johnny understands that the breath of death is drawing nearer, and all the songs here feel like flipping through an old photo album from the vantage point of his years. Most of them are covers, some of Cash's old songs, others of other artists' works, but none of them are blindly re-played acoustically, but rather stripped of unnecessary bells and whistles for an elderly man and seasoned with his wisdom (this version of "Hurt" many still consider original).
The artist left behind enough songs to fill five more albums, but no one will ever say his signature "Hello, I'm Johnny Cash" again.
Bob Dylan
2/5
Bob Dylan is an astonishing artist: all the covers of his songs I've heard seem better than the originals to me.
Dylan's lyrics are paramount, with the music coming second. But firstly, even native speakers don't always understand the lyrics, and secondly, are we listening to music here? It's incredibly monotonous: a semi-acoustic verse, a chorus, a harmonica solo, and we repeat.
Blonde on Blonde is considered Dylan's best album (the more devout consider it one of the best albums of all time). Why? How does it differ from his other works? Nothing, really, except that it's a double album.
And I'd give it a three if it weren't for the last song, which features the artist reading his poem for eleven minutes and then fading out. Now let's wait for the ∞-minute AI version, where Dylan's nasal voice simply combines all the existing words.
Tim Buckley
3/5
Looking at the genres of Tim Buckley's second album, it seems to be in keeping with the canons of the late '60s: psychedelia, folk, and medieval-inspired minstrelsy; we've heard it all before, nothing new. However, there is a nuance.
The main thing that sets Tim apart from the crowd of hippies of his era is his soaring voice. Here, it truly is a musical instrument, which the artist skillfully applies to jazz rhythms, pompous baroque, ballads, and acid melodies. Above all, this album is a pleasure to listen to thanks to the vocals.
At times melancholy, but overall a positive record, Tim's look at us from the cover is equally positive. However, this positive outlook is slightly clouded when you learn that the artist separated from his wife a month before the birth of his son, who would also record a good album a couple of decades later... But we'll get to that next time.
Missy Elliott
3/5
I'm a simple person: when I listen to a song sometimes I read lyrics, but I don't get too caught up in them. Music is my priority, and since hip-hop is not about it, the most important thing in a genre for me is a pumping beat.
On Missy Elliott's fourth and most popular album, it pumps. The rhythm is varied, with a strong old-school influence sometimes, all the guests are in their right places and don't make the tracks worse (even Beyoncé). Timbaland's (who was the main producer of the album) signature pulsating sound is also present here. Returning to the lyrical theme, the 2010s are still a long way off, and most female rap hasn't yet devolved into pornographic fan fiction, so there are only two more or less obscene songs here, the lyrics mostly about women's plight. Well, considering the realities of Virginia's black neighborhoods.
It's a decent album, not boring, kinda listenable. Compared to modern efforts in the genre, it's actually excellent.
Booker T. & The MG's
2/5
I understand that the authors of the "1001 Albums..." list included pieces that, to varying degrees, influenced music as a whole, but some of the entries baffle me.
For example, this record. Why does the band have such a strange name? Because they don't need a proper name; they're a house band for Stax, they've backed many of their artists, Booker T. is their lead pianist, and M.G. is short for "Memphis Group." Can you imagine a record by The Late Show Band making it onto a list of the best albums? Neither can I.
Although the album overall is decent, reasonably short, the organ and blues guitar duet works, and the title track has been used in so many different films and TV series that it automatically feels like a soundtrack. Did it need to be on the original list? Probably it did; it clearly inspired southern rock. Should it still be on there? The big question...
Fever Ray
3/5
When Karin Dreijer, the driving force behind Fever Ray, released her debut album, I missed it. And when she released her second album eight years later and toured with it, her shocking image so repulsed me that I didn't really want to listen to the music anymore. Time to make amends.
The very first song here will be familiar to many from the opening theme of the TV series "Vikings." Overall, the choice is logical — despite the album being primarily electronic, with elements of trip-hop, everything here sounds very ethnic, cold, and minimalistic; a northern feel, in fact. The deep, trance-inducing vocals, so heavily processed with various effects that it's sometimes hard to tell whether the singer is a woman, a man, a child, or some mythical creature, also add a touch of fairytale.
Björk used to do something like this, and Aurora would later occasionally do something similar. Not a bad album, need to listen to it again on a foggy, chill morning.
Ali Farka Touré
2/5
Ali Farka Touré heard blues as a child, figured it sounded very similar to the music of his people, and decided to make that kind of music. He did it for fun, because in Mali, music is made by the lower castes, and he was from the upper castes, the farmers.
So, during the first four songs of the album, I thought Ali simply couldn't play, because the guitar sounded like a Chinese toy — the kind some of you might have had as a child. It got a little better later on; these African motifs really do resemble blues, and it even works as background music, but it's all so repetitive.
There are music lovers and music journalists who sometimes say things like, "Yeah, Led Zeppelin are great, of course, but they borrowed all their ideas from Jimmy Ankubo, a black musician who in 1875 attached a string to a stick and thus invented the blues." It's people like these who boosted this album's average rating to 94 out of 100. God be their judge.
Prince
4/5
Have the authors shoved a soundtrack into the best albums list again!? Okay, we'll forgive them this time, since the story is unusual.
Prince was so elated by the albeit modest success of his previous album that he brought a script to Warner Music, confronting their bosses with the following fait accompli: "Either you get me a movie for which I'll write the music, or another label will help me do it."
The film starring Prince was more or less made, but it turned out to be a passing one, which can't be said about the album! This is Prince's most pop-oriented record, but he sparkles here — from the hedonistic opening track, the music flows through rich, lustful funk (the "Parental Advisory" sign owes its existence to the lyrics of "Darling Nikki") and screeching synthesizers to the monumental ballad of the same name.
Do you think an album can simultaneously contain classic of synth-pop and hair-metal? It can!
Sly & The Family Stone
5/5
If you asked a random person, say, from the crowd at a concert, to name a funk song, what do you think they'd remember? Maybe Michael Jackson's "Smooth Criminal," maybe Daft Punk's "Get Lucky," or at the very least, something by Jamiroquai.
But none of this would have happened without Sly Stone, who arguably invented the genre. Everything on this album sounds much harsher than that of the aforementioned artists — it's more a blend of black soul and white psychedelic rock, taking the best of both worlds: piercing vocals, rich bass, acidic keyboards, a wah pedal, and, most importantly, a wild, danceable energy. Sly himself worked in the same way, and despite the socially charged lyrics, there was no segregation within the band; both blacks and whites played there.
I'd never listened to this album before, but on this warm day it hit the spot.
Beyoncé
1/5
Beyoncé is the most overrated artist in history.
I don't understand how, other than a successful marriage to a billionaire rapper, her popularity is due. Take this album, for example. What's the most important thing in pop music? For a song to stick in your head after listening, for you to hum it automatically. There's not a single song like that here. Not a single memorable line, not a single melody, no interesting arrangements, no strong vocals — nothing! The only noteworthy aspect of this album is its promotional campaign, or rather, the lack thereof; the album was released without prior announcement, plus a music video was shot for each song. They say this was a first, which is debatable.
After the album's release, it was raved about by journalists everywhere, and Rolling Stone recently ranked it the sixteenth best album of the 21st century. Well, if Beyoncé was bringing me as much money as them, I'd put it there too — but as it is...
Frank Sinatra
3/5
Frank Sinatra can be criticized for many things, but one thing he certainly did well was sense the industry's currents.
It was the late 1960s, and in the US, blues, rock, and psychedelic music were taking popularity from jazz and swing, and then the "British Invasion" arrived. The artist knew he was at risk of being sidelined and decided it was time to look elsewhere — not to England, but to Brazil, the birthplace of bossa nova.
The new album was bound to be a success: it featured a sound no less fashionable at the time, accompaniment by one of the genre's creators, Antônio Carlos Jobim, his songs translated into English, and several jazz standards. Everything was in keeping with Sinatra's style, although one senses that bossa nova is too calm for him: the artist sometimes has to rein in his voice.
The perfect background for dinner, just like the last album I came across here by old Frank.
U2
5/5
I certainly don't think Bono became less concerned about the fate of poor African children in the early 90s, but believe it or not, this is a U2 album without the political slogans. Yes, that happens!
And that's not the only innovation; compared to the sound of their previous works, it's like we're hearing a completely different band here. I think fans who listened to this album for the first time felt the same way the average English fangirl of The 1975 heard the song "People."
No blasphemy, it's just that U2 became danceable on this album for the first time, so much so that George Michael would envy it, without forgetting their post-punk roots: The Edge's riffs are still jagged and crumbling, the rhythms are still pumping, though Bono's voice gets a bit tiresome by the end.
I generally like the country sound of previous Rattle and Hum, but it’s a good thing it failed in the charts, thereby forcing the band to reinvent themselves and release this album.
Pink Floyd
5/5
Overall, there's nothing to write about here. If anyone hasn't heard this album, they've definitely seen the iconic cover. Many consider The Dark Side of the Moon the best rock album ever made. Is there any reason for that?
While Pink Floyd is considered legendary in prog, this album is far removed from the genre. The lyrics are incredibly straightforward, the performance is quite simple, even primitive in places, with the riff in "Money" standing out. All the components are simply placed in the right places, and this could have been a simply good album.
If it weren't for the way it's mixed! It's no wonder audiophiles still use it to test their equipment — the sound is what makes this record so great. All the instruments sound vibrant, as do the fragments of phrases, the beating of a heart, the clink of coins, the wild laughter, the roar of an airplane...
And the best rock album in history is too subjective a concept; it doesn't exist, just as there is no dark side of the Moon really (as a matter of fact it’s all dark).
Ray Charles
3/5
The saddest thing about innovative ideas is that they remain innovative only for their time.
And so it is with this album. Another collection of cover versions, typical of the '60s, yet unusual: Ray Charles took American country standards (white music) and rewrote them as rhythm and blues (black music), thereby greatly expanding his audience and showing other artists that this was actually possible.
What does this mean to us now? Basically, nothing. What matters is that this is clearly not the album with which to get acquainted with Ray Charles's work. Not only did he seem to have deliberately chosen the most mournful love ballads, but his signature piano passages are also absent. Furthermore, the keyboards are completely lost against the waltz-like strings and choir; only the artist's voice remains.
In short, Maestro Ray has gone down the wrong path, but it will do as a background music.
Linkin Park
5/5
A legend of a generation: almost no one my age hasn't heard this album, and those who have are unlikely to ever forget it.
This record made rappers embrace riffs and metalheads embrace hip-hop. A colossus of nu-metal, which is surprising, as it lacks the genre's usual swearing, downtuned guitars, and any showing off — it's a completely honest album.
Three people create the magic here; the rest are craftsmen. The band's brains, Mike Shinoda, with his raps and Chester Bennington's unique voice, are understandable, but it wasn't until one of my recent listens that I realized Linkin Park would have remained a bland alternative act if not for DJ Joe Hahn's turntables and effects, which create half the atmosphere. If you remove one pillar from this trinity, the whole thing wouldn't crumble, of course, but it would lose its edge. Which, unfortunately, is what the current state of the group proves.
Gorillaz
5/5
Liam Gallagher, Damon Albarn's sworn friend, called this record "music for twelve-year-olds." There's some truth to that — I'll never give this album a low rating, not least because it was the one my parents gave me for my ninth birthday, along with my first CD player.
And how wonderful that it still sounds great to me now! Albarn, no matter how you look at it, is a genius and a visionary; what else could you call the man who, in the early 2000s, decided to create a hodgepodge of rock, hip-hop, reggae, trip-hop, and Latin music? And then he added to it an entire story about a virtual band, drawn by Jamie Hewlett, that those same nine- and twelve-year-olds absolutely latched onto.
They still latched onto it perfectly today, and this Gorillaz-invented "storyline" band trope works just as well for modern bands (hello, Twenty One Pilots). Thanks to them for this!
Supergrass
3/5
If you need to explain Britpop to someone in simple terms, you don't need to. Just play this album, because Supergrass has captured everything the genre has to offer: both the good and the bad.
At the beginning of the record, you think you've been sold some Blur substitute, but things get more complicated later. The band not only utilizes the hallmarks of the genre at the time, but also draws on their homeland's past achievements: there's punchy mod rock à la The Who, punk (more like pop punk), a touch of psychedelia, a touch of funk, and melodic Beatlesque. By the end, everything completely goes wild, turning into some kind of drunk, rollicking cabaret — much like the one on the cover. There's even a Wonderwall equivalent here.
A hilarious, diverse album, but it still falls short of a four star mark.
Bobby Womack
3/5
I was surprised to discover that Bobby Womack's voice was familiar to me — that fashionable man in a lavender suit staring at us from the cover sings on one of Gorillaz's most popular songs, "Stylo." And he's on there because "The Poet" is Damon Albarn's favorite album.
Bobby had a very uneven career: everything was fine in the early '70s, then there was a strange phase of experimenting with country music, three albums in a row that flopped, problems with drugs, and it's sheer luck that this record, released on an indie label about which you can barely find any information these days, became a hit.
Why this is so is a mystery. The songs are good, well-played, some danceable funk, some romantic soul, enjoyable to listen to, but nothing special. He was never able to replicate this success again; perhaps it was just providence.
Ramones
4/5
The Ramones' music is best described by guitarist Johnny: "We stripped away all the unnecessary parts and left only the essentials."
That's right. After the release of this album, all the guitar solos, complex chord progressions, eight-minute songs, and abstruse lyrics that were so overused in the '70s were consigned to the closet. All that remained was a hurricane of energy and vocal melodies straight out of the '50s. Rock 'n' roll had returned to its true essence.
At the time of its release, the album sold almost nothing; critics panned it, saying it was "noise, not music." Basically, it's like giving glasses to the monkeys, but when they realized they had to put them on and saw the light, they saw a wave washing away everything in its path. Thousands of guys (and girls!) with no musical education realized they could just pick up a guitar and rock for fun!
Without the Ramones, there would be no punk rock, no thrash metal, no hardcore, no emo, no any modern guitar music. And life would be decidedly more boring!
Echo And The Bunnymen
3/5
As the wise man once said, "If you want to impress an alt-girl, tell her your favorite band is The Cure; if you want to impress a lofty alt-girl, tell her your favorite band is Echo & The Bunnymen."
Their dark lyrics get even darker, their cold sound gets even colder. The band's manager also promoted the band strictly according to the rules of his occult ritual; the band was unaware of this, but spiritually, it couldn't help but weigh heavily on them.
As for the album, it's classic '80s English post-punk, but with a frosty blizzard feel. It's not very impressive at first, but the album opens up on the second side: they haven't come up with anything new, but practically repeat the first, only done better.
The bonus version includes the final track, "Never Stop," released as a single but not included on the main tracklist. Ironically, it's the most enjoyable song on the album.
The Stooges
4/5
Does the album cover remind you of anything? We've seen something similar somewhere...
That's right, The Stooges' debut was also recorded at Elektra, the same label behind The Doors (pun intended), which was in dire need of fresh blood because Jim Morrison was starting to act up. The label hoped the newcomers would continue the band's psychedelic blues lineage; in a sense, that's what happened, but the management didn't take into account the band's wild concerts, where the noise reached an unbearable level, and vocalist Iggy (then) Stooge would dive off the stage, smear himself with peanut butter, and cut himself with glass.
They managed to calm things down a bit in the studio, but no one else had ever produced a sound like that back then. While the blues motifs remained, they were augmented by fuzz guitars and primal drums. The band would later be dubbed proto-punks, which is debatable: there are no political manifestos, and the lyrics are at times banal and silly.
I'd give it five stars if not for the drone-like ten-minute "We Will Fall." If you're making a song which takes a third of an album you're better be sure it's a good one.
George Harrison
5/5
Everyone knows that Lennon and McCartney were the Beatles' primary songwriting duo. George Harrison also wrote songs, but either the duo simply aggravated him, or they didn't want to share the credit — in short, only one, or at most two, of his songs made it onto each album. Eventually, George grew tired of this and stopped pitching his songs to the band, instead writing them for the drawer.
And when, after the Beatles' breakup, it was time to open this drawer up, everyone gasped. As his first full-fledged solo effort, Harrison released a triple (yes!) album whose hit-making potential is astounding. All the melodies here are calm, sometimes a little sad, yet bright, sunny, and warming. The lyrics are pleasant monologues about friendship, God, and love, accompanied by the signature sound of slide guitar. Two hours fly by.
One could, of course, deduct a point for the third, essentially bonus, disc, consisting of half an hour of instrumental jams... But why?
Love
3/5
There are albums that many consider great, but you just don't understand them.
This Love record is one of those for me. As often happens, it was a sales flop at the time and even led to the band's disbandment, but decades later, music lovers have remembered it and elevated it to cult status.
I heard a late-'60s hippie sound here — yes, interesting orchestral arrangements, sometimes an unusual mix of Western folk rock and Eastern influences, a hint of flamenco, but seems like many people were making similar music better at the time. Although, off the top of my head, I can't think of anyone whose acoustics sounded so psychedelic.
Good, but not brilliant.
Britney Spears
3/5
Whatever one may say, at the very end of the 20th century, Britney Spears revolutionized teen pop music, which at the time relied on male and female dance groups, and returned it to the state of the '80s, when fans cared about a specific idol and listened to them through their eyes.
The driving force here, naturally, is the track of the same name, which now a pop-industry staple, then failed glam-rocker and aspiring producer Max Martin accidentally came up with after a sleepless night. Surprisingly, there are also several upbeat hits with elements of funk and dancehall. And, of course, love ballads that resonate so deeply with young female fans.
Yes, it's late-90s pop, where the song had more songwriters than you have coworkers in your coworking space, but if someone around sings "my loneliness is killing me," won't you yell back "AAAND I"? No? Swear to me! That's it. It's Britney, bitch!
Shivkumar Sharma
3/5
In short, this is the best-selling album of classical Indian music, recorded by three local masters. Traditional Indian santoor and bansoori are mixed here with flute and slide guitar.
In the mid-1960s, many Western rock musicians began experimenting with Eastern music, which eventually led to psychedelia. For the thus-warmed American and European public, this sound, on the one hand, was nothing new; on the other, only Indians could play their music so authentically. Word of mouth about the album was also helped by reviews from "advanced users": David Crosby, Bob Dylan, and, of course, George Harrison.
Pleasant, contemplative melodies, equally suitable for work, for starting the day, or simply for gazing at the sunset. After listening to it once, I automatically turned it on again.
Queen
2/5
Queen are hit-making machines; there's no arguing about that; two official best-of compilations are proof of that.
The paradox is that, compared to these compilations, listening to their albums in their entirety is quite difficult, especially with this second record. This is the band's most progressive-sounding, most art-rocking album; they've never reached such a level of pomposity, bordering on buffoonery, since. Not only are the songs long and multi-layered, with constantly shifting rhythms and fantasy lyrics about princes, queens, and ogres, but there are practically no pauses between them to catch your breath and take in what you've just heard.
The foundations and sound of the much-loved Queen are already here, but it's a good thing they later turned down the epic faucet a little.