1001 Albums Summary

Had no idea that this album was almost straight up blues music. Plant and Page are as stirring as advertised. A little too much griping about women for my taste.

Disc 1: As a Minnesotan I feel guilty that this cocktail on disc 1 just doesn’t work for me. Most of the tracks remind me of Saturday morning cartoon themes, but if cocaine was in the breakfast cereal (not derogatory). 30 seconds of every song are heavenly, and I can see how the “what the fuck is going on” vibe could be fun at a concert. At worst some of the tracks remind me of the “RZA unironically cooks up a trash beat” (derogatory). Disc 2: Melodies slap harder on this disk. Much more intelligible and focused on this side. ‘It’s Gonna Be A Beautiful Night’ is fucking awesome. I might need to dig for the best Prince live album to find what I’m looking for from him. Disc 1 is a 2, disc 2 is a 4, so 3 overall.

Tough for me to evaluate objectively because I hope to never need another breakup album in my life, and it makes me sad to even try and put myself in that headspace! It’s astounding how far away 1971 sounds on this album — this is a sound for a different generation that I can’t quite connect with since I can’t connect with Joni Mitchell the person during this time. I hate to say that some of her vocal runs feel pretty self-indulgent and don’t carry emotion for me, it’s more like a songbird doing math rock. I was able to connect with some of the more straightforward songs with simple, beautiful stories (Little Green, River, A Case of You)

Absolute heaven-sent music.

Not my cup of tea. Between this and the Led Zepp album I listened to the other day, a picture has been painted of what white guys in 1970 were complaining about and I don’t find it very flattering or self-reflective. I’d probably like this better as an instrumental album bc the singing guitars are obviously impressive. But even the guitars grew a bit grating for me by the second side of the album.

Maybe I’m just too much of a yankee to get it, but albums like these age worse for me with each passing year. I remember some of my friends playing these tracks in college and finding them charming, but now, not so much. Not something I’m interested in listening to again.