I was just arguing with nick gentry about how In My Life has annoying and gay lyrics.
This rocks and barrett and nick are stupid. Pure gold angsty 90s rock with a dash of the new fangled shoegaze for sublime emotional catharsis.
Listened to Jarons vinyl - he who asserts this is better than Thriller. Stupid! Still very good frankly, just not as cohesive and experimental as Thriller, and features more duds. At its best the incredibly tight and fast funk hits - ie Dont Stop and Working. Rock with you fills the gap between those two perfectly. Album never reaches those heights again, and especially peters out towards the ends.
Was just thinking about the worth of purely mindless, purely physical pop music such as this ("Relax your mind"... "just enjoy yourself"), lyrics that basically just tell you to dance and say vacuous things about love (though they move Michael so much he cries on the record). I feel like if I truly obeyed the purest principles I would not allow myself to listen such an album. I really do take issue with hedonistic music - art is for enlivening the mind, and here he is telling you to stop thinking. And yet.. its undeniably awesome. Michael is no master of the language of word (besides the use of "force" on the openers hook I love that), but here he is (approaching) being a master of the language of music (which he would reach wholly an album later). And perhaps all you need is the language of music, and let the lyrics sit back and be an excuse for him be also one of the best vocalists ever and make crazy ass noises, and find the deeper poetry therein.
In their Beatles-esque run in efficiency releasing masterpieces, Vol. 4 is their fourth album in three years, coming after what is probably regarded as the last truly iconic Sabbath album Master of Reality. Vol. 4 is still awesome and rightly beloved by slightly more in tune fans. The production here might be their best - Iommi's downtuned guitar with an even more evil sound than Master of Reality , dirtier yet with a strange (chorusy?) gloss to it which rings with every full 6 string chord - and Geezer's bass with all the percussiveness taken away, pure deep bass, which almost seems like an affront to his iconic sound but works beautifully here - just listen to those fat slides he employs on songs to add rhythm and bounce to Iommi's riffage.
However, while my narrative of this album going into it - an album that shows serious cracks, repetition and a need for a big change - was not as stark as I thought, it is certainly still there. It's apt the album ends on basically a carbon copy of the N.I.B. instrumental, down to the same solo licks. It would be the last of what I call their 'E minor pentatonic albums' before Rick Wakeman would be enlisted for the proggy follow up album Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (which rules too - making 5 classic albums in a 4 year period.)
Also to follow up on my discussion in on Off the Wall, what about albums that are just stupid? Black Sabbath is stupid. They are stupid. It's Ozzy Osbourne for god's sake. After singing a line about 'icicles in my brain" on a song called "Snowblind" Ozzy whispers "COCAINE" into your ear for good measure. And you heard Changes. "I feel unhappy, I feel so sad." Bravo. It is the same with Michael, however - while they lack literary prowess, the band that basically opened and almost immediately closed the book on the entire genre of Metal clearly had some other genius bestowed on them. Iommi and his guitar here is the real master and probably has had an equal if not greater effect on modern language as the great poets.
Fairly unfamiliar with this one - heard it once ages ago but have totally forgotten it. Now comes the problem with this format which is trying to gather a proper opinion on an album in a single day. I try.
I think the key to enjoying this album is realizing you're never going to quite get the huge 80s pop chorus you think is coming, and instead PS keeps it reserved throughout. Very notable on When Loves Breaks Down - the chorus is a simple plodding beat with almost Cocteau Twins esque atmosphere instead of the Tears for Fears explosion that the production style betrays. Arty farty 80s pop rock for sure. Pretty sick still.
Some serious white boy, dusty, mid 80s rap. The type where they say "girly" and it sounds like the 808 was invented the week before. These boys have serious charisma though and rap off each other like its nothing. Very fun album undeniably, though I understand their sound would coalesce on later albums.
Can we talk about the guitar break on Fight for your Right? Rick Rubin got Kerry King in there and was like Ok play a pentatonic solo. He could not do it - listen to that shit. Maybe the worst solo on a major hit. Why would he make Kerry king do that? How does Kerry king not know how to do that? Why leave it on the track? Thankfully he realized the error of his ways and allowed him to do it Kerry style on the next track.
3.5
Heard bits of this album growing up from my dad, it's remained a staple of my life ever since fully sitting down and listening to it sometime in college. Perfectly captures an unknowable sadness with a pop energy that has been almost unmatched since, even from the band itself. While Stipe gives the performance of a lifetime, I think Mills is the MVP here with a backup vocal style that may be the most defined of any ever. His off kilter yet perfectly precise soaring vocals offset Stipe to create the fully realized yet unknowable atmosphere that makes this album what it is. Peter Buck and Bill Berry's experimentation on their respective instruments is also simply unbelievable - Berry on Moral Kiosk and Buck on 9-9 (a track that used to simply feel novelty but now is a stand out for me for it's subtle yet tight insanity) are the highlights. While the lyrics border on pure nonsense, it's hard not to note a sorrow, especially on the 4 lines that comprise Talk About the Passion. "Not everyone can carry the weight of the world" is a line that unfortunately often comes to me.
Hard to imagine a band coming out more fully formed than this - the soulfulness of Stipe and Mills singing, the almost purely phonetic lyricism, the incredibly tight songwriting and rhythm section, and the impenetrable melancholy of it all. The kind of music you dance to with tears in your eyes.
Guffawed when this popped up after submitting the last review. Hope you're happy Soph.
Been meaning to listen to this one forever as someone who has given his fair share of listening time to Nu Metal and will continue to valiantly defend the Korn debut. Hard to tell from the 1 1/2 listens but I think they've earned their fame - at times it feels derivative of Korn but certainly they carved at least a pretty significant sound of their own. Wildly frantic and all sorts of weird shit going down like the erratic variety of vocal styles Corey goes through and all the doohickeys they bang on. Gotta do something with the 8 dudes in this band. Feels like the missing link between probably the two best nu metal bands (that aren't SOAD - who I would say hardly count - though funnily enough Corey Taylor puts on a carbon copy Serj flow on Eyeless), Korn and Linkin Park. Certainly thoroughly enjoyable, deserves more listening.
3.5
Just remember everything I said about Vol. 4 and how it was a signal of regression from their masterpiece albums, and note that this is THE masterpiece album. Only the pair of Hand of Doom and Rat Salad are lacking, otherwise it's impossible to deny the rest are basically permanently imprinted onto popular culture and (besides Faeries Wear Boots, which has come to be one of my favorite tracks - unbelievable groove on that song) and deservedly so).
I remember getting into a quasi argument with some dude at a furry boardgame night (ask me about it if i've not told this story) who was in some new age metal band about how Sabbath is still the heaviest. I guess he was operating from the point of view that certainly some blokes in the 70s fucking around in E standard playing blues licks could not be the heaviest instead of these gay asses playing in Drop G with double kicks and breakdowns yadda yadda yadda. He failed to consider that metal and art in general does not get better as it continues, it's merely expanded upon. And something like the genre of metal is niche enough that any expansion, especially at this point, is pale imitation of what came before it or just absurd withdrawal into the niche that means nothing to those not sucked into the cult. I think the only band who does battle with Sabbath's spot in my mind is Boris, and they're barely even metal half the time. Sabbath, and especially Paranoid, has the mark of the masterpiece - it is timeless. It is timelessly heavy, hellish, chilling, and also kinda funny.
2 for 2 on the soph hoodies.
Not a cure album I was super familiar with, but it is excellent. Might be the gloomiest album Ive heard - feels like the last spastic moans of a man about to take himself out of the game. As truly Gothic as it gets.
In which we learn that whoever wrote the book this is based on is British, because how else would this be here. "Those chaps across the pond probably never 'eard of SHACK - gotta put 'em on."
I discussed with John while listening to this that a mark of a mediocre work of art is that the best you can say about it is that it purely evokes a specific time and place - and with this one can maybe I can somewhat grasp the feeling of being 10 seconds away from being carted off in a NHS ambulance due to being mutilated in Liverpool over soccer or some shit while piss drunk in the late 90s. A very saccharine, overwrought, and uninspired by anything but Oasis + strings 10 seconds. Good god, the chorus of one of them is "You and I .... gotta pull together!" C'mon. Any list like this is going to be impossible to get right but there's like one Coltrane album and here we are with some C - tier britpop. It has it's moments, it's got a novelty to it, and I wouldn't say it's bad, but wildly undeserving of such a spot.
Some fun early punk / glam stuff. Just thought about Rocky Horror the whole time. Really only the first track is that Rocky-esque, but it put the thought in my mind. The album cover conveys that vibe as well. I guess I think about Rocky a lot since I saw it a lot - my ex loved it and would star in the productions at UVA. I remember when they played Eddie - when Frankenfurter kills him they staged it by falling into my arms when getting killed. I think about that a lot. They really did love me. It's been a long time since I broke up with them. They still remain in my mind the only time I've even attempted love - despite the fact they're such a distant memory and are so abstracted at this point that I can't remember what they look like very clearly, themselves as the romantic ideal still persists. I thought about showing them this album, that they might like it. I never much did stuff like that during the relationship, so I have thoughts like that a lot as some sort of coping mechanism. Maybe to indicate to myself what I should do in the future. As if these romantic ideals and fantasies don't immediately change if not entirely evaporate once in an actual relationship. One can only love at a distance, in the imagination. Perhaps it was a feedback loop - I was distant, so they loved me more, gave more of themselves to me, and further I went, and the more they loved me. There was no mystery. I kept my distance as I knew it'd end someday, of course. And it did. I've never been able to tell if love itself is the broken concept or it is just me. Either way, the unchanging variable in existence is loneliness.
3.5
I don't know man. It's okay. I'm mildly hungover
They said "Lyle you're a misogynist" "Lyle whens the last time you read a female author" "Lyle this" Well look at that. I gave Hole a 4, that's right. Courtney Love is a fantastic vocalist and great lyricist even if she did kill Kurt. Love the very open and echo-y production. Not gonna pretend I have anything pithy to say about the albums themes of feminine rage. Very good.
3.5-4
Was expecting some tacky stuff when I realized its gonna be a South Asian music x Electronic crossover, which one can tell by just looking at the most 2000s ass electronic cover with a little Ganesha for good measure. Thought it might have just been thrown on the list just for that British colonization guilt clearly operating here considering how much Hindustani music is on this list (and it probably still was) - I think there's as many Indian classical music albums as Jazz. Was quite pleasantly surprised however - Singh is clearly extremely well versed in both genres truly searches in depth between the two. Problem is that I'm not very well versed in electronic and even less so in South Asian music so it's hard to get a read, especially after just a listen. Could see myself coming back to it though.
3.5
Man this generator better stop giving us bullshit im getting burnt out. This is 60s Singer/Songwriterism with all the bad parts (white boy blues, awkward producer arrangements) and none of the poetry that made it what it is.
Undeniable. Had a "this is gay" reaction at first but it ultimately ended up winning me with it's perfect melancholy and dense yet perfectly poppy songwriting. Will have to relisten further.
