An absolutely fun and electric record from the early days of rock 'n' roll, the whole album just sounds like one big wild party. Little Richard's vocals are easily the highlight here, the way he passionately screams and shouts definitely became the blueprint for thousands of rock and soul vocalists throughout the years. The instrumentation is so on point as well, with the rhythm section supplying these great driving rock beats alongside some juicy sax solos. The only thing I'd complain about is that some of the songs do end up sounding pretty similar, but with this being sub 30 minutes, it's not that much of issue for me.
A really good piece of Neo-traditionalist country, headed by three of the queens of the country genre. The three work off of each other incredibly well, although I wish there were more tracks like "Farther Along" that had each of them have their own verse. Even still, hearing them harmonize with each other on most of the tracklist is still enough to have me satisfied throughout.
The instrumentation is classic country with very few pop frills, making it stand out quite well among the dredge of country pop of the era that was much more corporate pop with a vague southern twang. Guitar legend Albert Lee and fiddler Mark O'Connor have some incredible solos throughout, showcasing their technical ability as well as the beautiful melodicism that they weave through every track.
The songs kind of blend together during the middle of this project, but it starts and ends so strongly that it ends up making this project work overall.
The perfect fall album, the mix between the eerily beautiful and foreboding dissonant makes this one of the all time peaks of gothic and punk music. Lyrically this generally comes across to me as an exploration of the fascination of morbidity: through insatiable lust (Spellbound, Sin in My Heart, Head Cut, Voodoo Dolly), to critique of the viewpoints of women in current cultures (Arabian Knights, Night Shift), and to how the passage of time causes us to reflect on how we view the macabre itself (Into the Light, Halloween). While arguably the first half is slightly more balanced than the second half, I still thoroughly enjoy every song on here as each one offers its own unique sonic experience, especially since the close "Voodoo Dolly" ends this record perfectly on Siouxsie's hauntingly beautiful chants mixed with the wails of John McGeoch's guitarwork and the tribal patterns of Steven Severin and Budgie's bass/drum rhythms.
This is the first real reggae record I've listened to, and it was a really intriguing and satisfying musical experience. Obviously I've heard the big hits from Bob Marley, as well as the reggae material from punk bands like Bad Brains, but hearing all of these songs in the concept of a record really put things in perspective. Bob Marley is an excellent storyteller, portraying stories of the Jamaican ghetto and of his own homelessness contrasted with the Rastafarian emphasis of celebrating life for what it is. That said, he definitely isn't ignorant to the injustices of the world that cause people to pursue revolution, with the final track containing some of his most vivid imagery.
Another thing I took away from this record was the considerable blues influence, as Bob Marley's wails and crooning isn't that too unlike that of the vocals of American blues singers like Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters. The instrumental offerings of guitarist Al Anderson and harmonicist Lee Jaffe add to this backbone, contributing to tracks like "Talkin' Blues" and "Rebel Music" with a sense of emotional anguish. "No Woman No Cry" definitely takes the cake in the marriage of the instrumentation and Marley's lyricism, especially with the emotive guitar solo that ends the track.
A pretty damn fun glam metal record, Def Leppard follows up their breakout album "High 'n' Dry" with an album that leans even more into the hook based pop sounds of the 80s glam metal scene without sacrificing the dynamic riffing and soloing that made the previous album so appealing. This album contains some of my favorite songs from Def Leppard: from the anthemic opener "Rock! Rock! (Till You Drop)" to the sleek rockers of "Photograph" and "Rock of Ages" and the power ballads "Too Late For Love" and "Foolin'", this album is a pretty great variety of different 80s rock/metal sounds that never really get boring even after hearing them to death on classic rock radio.
The only song I really don't care too much for is the middle track "Die Hard the Hunter", as it feels the most processed and really drags due to it being the longest song on the record at over 6 minutes. In many ways this song kind of foreshadows the following album "Hysteria", which while it isn't a bad record by any means, it ends up feeling pretty bloated and overly glossy in a way that "Pyromania" doesn't. This album still feels fresh and alive to this day, helped by the production of Robert "Mutt" Lange, who produced the previous record and several other hard rock records of the day, like AC/DC's "Highway to Hell" and "Back in Black".
First Talking Heads album I've listened to the whole way through and this was a really damn good experience. This album takes the funk-inspired New Wave sound that was beginning to take shape during the late 70s and mixes it with a dissonant atmospheric edge that makes this an incredibly mind bending experience. Songs like "Cities" can have vocalist David Byrne belt out lyrics about disillusionment in a strained, panicked delivery over tops this lively, danceable instrumental section and it still sounds great, this dichotomy really immerses me into the paranoia of this world the band depicts. Of course, this is also thanks to producer Brian Eno, who makes what could be very directionless songs hit with an incredible punch, every song sounds very modern and digital yet so alive as well.
The lyrics on this record are some of my favorite, as it describes paranoia from the mundane and satirical ("Animals" and "Cities") to more cerebral and conceptual cuts that really make you feel as if the walls are closing in on you ("Memories Can't Wait", "Heaven", "Life During Wartime"). Closing track "Drugs" is easily the best song on the album for me, as Byrne sounds absolutely manic portraying a drug addict during a bad trip that seems to go on for eternity, despite his self-reassurances that "It'll be over in a minute or two". The instrumentation on this song is especially haunting, as synths and guitars create this sonic atmosphere that is absolutely crushing and ethereal, adding to the confusion that one would feel in this wide awake nightmare.
That said, the one song I really didn't care for on this album was the penultimate "Electric Guitar". While I definitely the get the satire in the Satanic panic of how electric guitars corrupt the brain of anyone listening, the song just falls flat for me as it doesn't feel as complete of a package as the rest of the material on here. The instrumentation is fairly plain, with a weird psuedo-brassy synth lead throughout that just ends up feeling annoying and out of place. Still, the rest of the material on here is so high quality that this one fluke really doesn't affect my love of this project overall too much.
I liked this album a lot as a kid, but man this did not age well. For starters, it's way too goddamn long, its 73 minutes with 17 tracks with not a lot of quality control, so this album drags hard, especially in the last leg. A lot of songs could have been easily trimmed down or cut entirely, namely the ending of "Funky Monks", and especially the tracks "The Greeting Song" and "Sir Psycho Sexy". The former is just a very boring piece of butt rock that even the members themselves don't like, and the latter is a bloated 8 minute mess of a track that isn't sexy or funny at all, it's just really uncomfortable to listen to. I know people don't care for the closer "They're Red Hot", a cover of the classic blues song by Robert Johnson, but I never really hated it too much. Yeah, it's definitely a novelty in the vein of how Van Halen covers were during the David Lee Roth era, but at the same time it's enough of a departure that it's more cute than anything.
This isn't to say that there aren't good cuts on this, the opener "The Power of Equality" starts off fairly strong with a very punchy riff, and the songs "Give it Away", "Suck My Kiss", and "Blood Sugar Sex Magik" are actually really fun bangers that actually use sensuality in an endearinag way. The acoustic ballads "Breaking the Girl" and "Under the Bridge" actually end up as my favorites of the album, as vocalist Anthony Keidis lays out his heart and emotions in such a very sensitive and moving way that they hit extremely hard, especially with the atmospheric touches they implement with the Mellotron in the former, and a female choir in the latter.
Speaking of Anthony Keidis, he ends up being very inconsistent on this record, as while on some songs his quirky delivery ends up contributing to the party vibe it's trying to convey, and other times it just sounds like extremely awkward white boy rapping that you'd hear on a Vanilla Ice album. The rest of the band plays very well, especially John Frusciante, as both his lead and rhythm work are pretty interesting to listen to, with Flea and Chad Smith laying down the funky back beat usually pretty well.
I probably won't come back to listen to this album in full again any time soon, I'd much rather listen to a Primus or Faith No More project to get my fill of quirked up white boys who can lay down a funky tune, or (even better!) listen to some actually funk like Parliament/Funkadelic or Sly and the Family Stones.
Kind of hard to say what hasn't already been said about this record, but yeah this is a bone fide masterpiece. Kind of insane that this was released in 1967, it still has a very noisy and punky edge that fits well in today's climate as well. Even the more melodic cuts like "Sunday Morning" and "I'll Be Your Mirror" still have a very atmospheric and almost eerie quality to them, especially on the tracks that feature Nico on vocals, really love her monotone voice. Every song she's on feels like she's just out of reach but you keep trying to convince yourself that you can get to her if you really try.
Pretty much a distillation of Motörhead's sound: loud, fast, and rude rock 'n' roll pushed to its absolute limits. Lemmy's "lead bass" playing is probably at his most direct hear, as half the time the main riff of the song will be driven by his distinctive bass sound going directly through your skull. And those riffs are mean as hell, while a main complaint that many have is that Motörhead have too many songs that sound the same to each other, what makes me not care as much is simply due to how catchy and powerful the riffs of every song tends to be. This is helped extremely well by the production, which very well might be my favorite production on a Motörhead album. Each instrument already sounds gritty and powerful by themselves, but when put all together it just creates this storm of rock 'n' roll that just blows nearly every other record out of the water.
That said, this record has a massive Achilles heel in the infamous track "Jailbait", where Lemmy describes his desire for a "teenage baby" that he doesn't even dare ask the age of but she's old "enough" to be backstage where he has sex with his other groupies. Obviously this song is very distasteful lyrically and there's good enough reason to suspect that Lemmy most likely has had sex with at least a few underage girls due to his claimed sexual exploits of sleeping with over 2000 women over the years. However, Phil Taylor and Lemmy have also claimed in an interview that that track was in fact to dissuade men from committing any sexual offenses with minors who ended up backstage, and Lemmy even wrote a song in the 90s called "Don't Let Daddy Kiss Me" which very bluntly speaks out against child sexual abuse. So what do we do with this information? Undoubtably even if "Jailbait" was meant to be a cautionary tale not to entertain any sexual advances made by underage fans, the song's cheeky delivery and the exclamations of "you're so fine" and "I just can't wait" just end up muddying the waters. But at least it wasn't as bad as Ted Nugent's "Jailbait", where he explicitly brings up the age of a thirteen year old girl who he "knows is clean" and even offers to share her with the police officer arresting him at the end of the song.
So yeah, I guess what I'm saying is that if you're able to divorce "Jailbait" as an extremely dated product of its time that didn't portray its apparent intended affect, you'll be able to enjoy 11 pretty damn fantastic rock songs.
Don't know if I fully understood the lyrics to this, but still a very entertaining listen. Despite being over 90 minutes long, it held my attention for the entirety of the runtime, helped immensely by the composition and production. The writing is very eclectic for a prog album, with the mood swinging from soft and introspective to wild and experimental in a way that feels completely natural. The lyrics by Peter Gabriel are very striking and evocative, and while I'm not entirely sure how to interpret them, they definitely succeed in painting a scene quite well.
A pretty fun post-grunge/pop rock record with a nice bit of personality coming through from Alanis. Definitely a better than a lot of the rest of the mediocre alt rockers trying to be the next Pearl Jam or Nirvana, but still something that I won't experience in full very often. The main singles off of this record do end up shining a lot more than the deep cuts on here but none of the tracks on here are bad to be honest.
A really great slab of some old school New York hip-hop, supplied with great lyricism from GZA and incredible dark, moody production by RZA. GZA's verses are so dense with wordplay and internal rhyme schemes, it's almost dizzy keeping up with him, but what I love about his verses is that he does it in a way that supports and deepens the theme of each track(hear that Dax?), as well as painting some absolutely dark and vivid pictures about urban life, especially on tracks like "Cold World". The guest verses from Wu-Tang members are also incredibly welcome, as they obviously play off of each other extremely well, leading to every single posse cut on this record feeling like a battle rap where everybody is at their A-game.
The only real track on here that I didn't feel as much as the rest of the tracks was "Swordsman", as while I do like the concept of it being about GZA telling the listener to open up their mind, it delves a little too heavily into 5 percenter bullshit that I don't particularly care for.
While not as good as "Enter the 36 Chambers" or other Wu-Tang member solo albums like Ghostface's "Supreme Clientele" or Raekwon's "Only Built 4 Cuban Linx...", this record is still quite fantastic and deserves its place in the top hip hop albums of all time.
The hour and a half runtime and multiple songs exceeding or nearly hitting the 20 minute mark may seem daunting at first, but trust me when I say that listening to "Bitches Brew" is genuinely a spiritual experience you have to try at least once in your life. Miles Davis assembled arguably one of the greatest lineups to grace our mortal plane, who would later go on to define jazz fusion and jazz-rock later on into the 70s and 80s, ranging from Return to Forever's Chick Corea (electric piano) and Lenny White (drums), Weather Report's Wayne Shorter (saxophone) and Joe Zawinul (electric piano), to Mahavishnu Orchestra's Billy Cobham (drums) and John fuckin' McLaughlin (guitar).
The material on this record pushes jazz to its absolute limits, even more so than previous record "In A Silent Way" which already alienated jazz critics due to its rock influenced soloing and song structures, and dialing all of that to 11, with a hefty dose of funk as well. The opener "Pharaoh's Dance" sets the tone for this record incredibly well: following the opening drum beat, the keyboards float in with this beautifully eerie melody before being joined by a jamming session with the bass clarinet, guitar, and bass, before transitioning into this funky groove led by Miles Davis' striking trumpet soloing alongside the rest of the jamming happening around him. Rather than melodic soloing that people would expect from a bebop or cool jazz record, these solos and musical moments are highly dependent on the rhythm that they end up playing, especially due to the overlapping instruments playing all at once. This overlaying of rhythms makes this album reminiscent of folk, especially from African and South American descent, as all of these different layers come to make a whole that is far greater than the sum of its parts. Especially considering that most of all of the material on this record was improvised over a three day, three hour a day, recording session, with Miles Davis only supplying the band with the tempo, a brief melody/chord progression, and the mood that the track was going for, it absolutely shows the creativity and talent on display that they were able to construct these dense soundscapes.
That said, despite all of the tracks sharing similarities to each other, they each stand out in their own separate ways: the aforementioned "Pharaoh's Dance" has an overall celebratory tone; title track "Bitches Brew" feels like a chaotic conversation, with each instrument wanting to get their "point" across in the form of wild, frenetic soloing; "Spanish Key" and "John McLaughlin" are the more heavily rock influenced tracks, with the former having a more sexy funk based rhythmic feel to it, while the latter is dominated by the conversation between John McLaughlin's virtuostic guitar playing and the electric piano players Corea and Zawinul. Closing out the record, "Miles Runs the Voodoo Down" is a lovely homage to Jimi Hendrix, as the psychedelic instrumentals keep the groove and swagger that the late guitarist was known for; while "Sanctuary" concludes the record on an atmospheric journey, letting the listener breathe for a bit before picking up the pace and intensity once again until the breakdown at the end where the music finally settles down back to earth.
While I think that it would be best for a casual jazz listener to start with something like Herbie Hancock's "Head Hunters" or the previous record "In a Silent Way" before diving into a record as rhythmically and sonically dense as this, I still highly recommend this record to any music fan. It's definitely an album that you need to sit down with and really grow accustomed to, but "Bitches Brew" will reward an attentive listener tremendously throughout jazz-fusion odyssey.
This is Outkast's "White Album": an album where each member recorded songs that reflected more of their taste that was growing increasingly further apart, and then putting them back together as one massive double album. The over 2 hour, 40 track run time of "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below" might seem daunting at first, but considering that its essentially just two albums stacked in one, you can easily just listen to the first disc, give it a listen, and then pop in the second disc at a slightly later time and still feel fulfilled. Hell, even listening to both discs back-to-back, them being so radically different from one another massively helps this not feel like such a monotonous chore to get through.
Big Boi's "Speakerboxxx" is a Southern hip hop record at its core, still full of the braggadocious and ice cold bars one would expect from a rapper like him, mixed with a heavy dose of funk instrumentation and reflections on god, parenthood, and society at large. The second disc, Andre 3000's "The Love Below", is a different beast entirely however: it bounces from several different genres, from the pop rap of "Spread" to neo-soul/funk/R&B in the vein of Prince on cuts like "Roses" and "Love in War", all the way to the jazz musings like on the opening number "Love Hater" and wild instrumental cover of "My Favorite Things". Plus, this second disc is formatted more in the vein of a concept album, explore a man's sexual escapades and desire to find a woman, but still having his own emotional insecurities holding him back from committing full time to a relationship. This ends up making Big Boi's side feel that much more unbalanced, as while he definitely has some creative highs on this record, like on the tracks "Unhappy" and "Reset" that talk about the struggles he went through in order to achieve this level of success, a lot of the songs end up feeling not fully realized, especially when there are no features to bounce off of. Songs like "Bust" and "War" have good concepts to them, but feel like they end far too abruptly, and are desperate for an extra verse in order to tie them more neatly together. Also, the interludes on Big Boi's side feel much more like filler due to how short and inconsequential they feel for the flow of the album, especially in the latter third when there's an interlude nearly every other song.
Speakerboxxx Rating: 6-7/10
The Love Below Rating: 7-8/10
Really great sophomore album from one of folk's most perennial voices. In many ways this kind of feels like the launching off point for the rest of his late 60s and early 70s catalogue, with poignant protest songs and a sense of surreal humor that would make tracks like "Like a Rolling Stone" and "All Along the Watchtower" such classic songs. Bob Dylan's biggest strength is his lyricism, and tracks like "Blowin' in the Wind", "Masters of War", and especially "Oxford Town" really show how simple yet poetic it can be as he describes the social injustices of the day and the true horror of that being your lived experience.
One of the best live records ever made, full stop. Every song is full of so much life and passion, you can just feel the electricity of the moment despite it being recorded over 55 years ago. This would also be one of the last recordings of the legendary Duane Allman before his tragic motorcycle accident in October 1971, and he delivers a true tour de force, with his solos being filled with bluesy Southern soul, as well as there being a lot of atmospheric elements reminiscent of King Crimson jam tracks, especially on the songs "In Memory of Elizabeth Reed" and "Whipping Post".
Starts off pretty promising but quickly just devolves to every single 90s alt rock cliche you've heard, plus with the added chamber pop elements they just sound like an inferior copy of the Smashing Pumpkins. The only thing that I can say that kind of makes them unique are the admittedly pretty interesting lyrics, especially on tracks like "Susan's House" and "My Beloved Monster", but other than that I can't really recommend this album to anyone else.
A really great, melancholic piece of 90s indie folk. Elliott Smith's lyrics are incredibly blunt and can kind of border on edgy at times, but he does paint a pretty damn compelling picture out of them, aided well by his very wistful delivery. The instrumentation is also pretty damn solid, as his strumming contains a lot of percussive stops and starts as well as great melodic leads, and when the intensity is increased with him playing as a full band, like on "Cupid's Trick", has a rich fullness to it.
A fun concept of a record, but not one that I'll end up revisiting often unfortunately. While I think I liked the Beastie Boys a lot when I was younger, their style of rapping quickly ends up getting on my nerves due to how basic a lot of their bars end up being, especially when comparing them to 80s rap legends like Rakim, Public Enemy, or NWA. That said, I did end up really enjoying the tracks "Johnny Ryall", "Shadrach", and "Car Thief", they have a level of storytelling that feels very real and penetrates through their admittedly pretty douchey frat boy demeanor they exude on the rest of the track list.
Also I shouldn't need to say this, but of course the beats on here are absolutely killer, the samples they end up using really elevate the atmosphere of the record, turning pretty meh songs into something that I could end up bumping and tolerating. It really makes you feel like you're on a street in Brooklyn, listening to all of the different tracks being blared from the residents into one singular sound that feels alive. This is especially true on tracks like "Shake Your Rump" and "Hey Ladies", as while I find the bars to be pretty corny and juvenile, the incredible sampling work easily carries and makes them feel a lot more fun and lighthearted. The two interludes, "5 Piece Chicken Dinner" and "Ask for Janice" I could do without, they just end up feeling like filler. Final track "B-Boy Bouillabaisse" is fine too, I understand the concept of them trying to do their own "Abbey Road" ending medley, but due to each part of the suite feeling like undercooked demos of an unfinished full song, they don't gel very well together, something the last half of "Abbey Road" does much more cohesively in my opinion.
While this is definitely an important piece of hip hop history, I just can't shake the feeling that I respect what it's trying to do rather than actually enjoying it as its own standalone project.
A pretty damn good slice of 80s jazz-pop, you can pretty much view this project as a spiritual successor to Steely Dan, which had recently disbanded due to inner personal turmoil as well as disagreements in musical direction on "Gaucho". In order to differentiate itself from its 70s brethren, "The Nightfly" is a very slick record that is ready for radio play, as its jazzisms are more subdued in order to make way for more simplistic R&B and pop sounds, with less soloing and more tight melodies. Fagen's vocals are also quite smooth, as the harmonies that he plays with feel almost Beatlesque of how they interact with the instrumentals. That said, while I didn't dislike any of the material on here, nothing really stands out all that much, aside from the occasional catchy hook or melodic lead, the musical side of this record ends up feeling very corporate.
A really fun techno/dance record, it's repetitive enough so that you can dance to it, but there's enough going on behind the scenes that still makes it really interesting to intently listen to and dissect. Also, the opening and closing looped tracks are fire, if you dislike them you just have a skill issue.
Unironically one of the most hauntingly beautiful albums I've ever heard, can't believe it's taken me this long to finally listen to this.
A really fun piece of garage rock revival from the early 2000s. To be perfectly honest, I pretty much prefer something like this compared to how more processed The White Stripes would end up becoming, even though "Seven Nation Army" is an absolute banger. Jack White's wails pair perfectly with the wall of feedback and distorted garage punk riffs he pumps out as well as Meg White's basic but very emotive drumming. In a way she kind of reminds me a lot of Paul Ledney from Profanatica, as while they aren't technical drummers in the slightest, they play with such attitude and energy that really can't be emulated by anyone else. The softer moments like on "We're Going to Be Friends" also feel extremely natural with this stripped back sound, as you really focus on the story that Jack White reminisces on here, playing in your head as if it's happening right in front of you.
