1001 Albums Summary

A joyous 1960s coming of age with some surprising little Motown sounds amongst the California surf rock. If the lyrics were problematic in 2026, I didn’t notice. “Help me, Rhonda” was the clear favourite.

A slow and uninspiring start opens up into a really nice album from heart of gold onwards. Except for A Man Needs A Maid. Someone should talk to Neil about that…

Was it a rock album? A symphony? An acoustic exploration? A masterpiece? I have no idea. If I could give it 3.5 I would

Listening to the prodigy at 6am with a baby, a coffee, and a bowl of oatmeal hits different to listening to the prodigy at 6am at a music festival.

I really don’t want to write another review about a problematic man, but too many songs here were about young girls. Bring on a female artist!

I’d pre-written the review. It was going to be a novella detailing my struggle to celebrate the melodic, ethereal genius, with the things I knew he’d done. Am I ok to cancel culture the 1001 albums? Would I drop him from five stars to four because of that? Turns out I didn’t need to worry. With the exception of Life on Mars, the album was ok.

My nervous system couldn’t even make it all the way through the first song.

A recency bias for sure, but Loretta Lynn is the poor woman’s Dolly Parton. The songs all sounded the same and only left me wanting Jolene and 9 to 5. RIP Dolly.

This album contains at least five of the anthems we need right now. R.E.M for all.

I didn’t know I had this Hole in my music history and I wish I’d known this version of Courtney Love before today! I enjoyed this grunge goodness from start to finish.

The perfect running playlist does not exi….

Fun, upbeat, and full of trials and tribulations, what a yo yo! I did like it and I still think four minutes is a good length for a song.

I didn’t realise how much I’d missed Jenny, Andy and Natalie. Hot Fuss, you’re a star ⭐️

I’m not talking to John about my reviews before I post them anymore. Mine was going to be better! It was “now I see where my chemical romance and the wiggles got their inspiration.” Or maybe it would have been a connections category. But he ruined it.

Music to put the baby to sleep that unfortunately didn’t put the baby to sleep

This is what you listen to while drinking red wine and cooking your new love interest bolognese for the first time. Lovely

Some fun songs and a good enough stop on my music edification journey but ultimately discordant and just not my style. Sorry Beastie Boys.

I wish the music was more engaging so that I paid attention to the important messages. I did like the pan flute though.

We all have bad days at work. Today’s was the person who picked this for 1001 albums to listen to before you die.

If I didn’t give this album four stars it would only be because of my ego, I sang along to every song.

I think this tried to take me to strange places in my mind, but I wasn’t high enough to get there.

I thought the Divine Comedy wasn’t going to make it to Paradise, but then The Frog Princess came on 🌅

I bopped along. No time to write more, there’s 7 other albums to catch up on!

The stories of the hard done by with a harmonica at times that could rival Billy Joel. I was surprised that I enjoyed this quite a bit.

To have lived this version of the 90s would have been special

Only Panic at the Disco have ever perfected the art of the long song title. Sorry Sufjan Stevens.

It’s got soul, it’s got blues, and most importantly my 13 year old self had no idea how lucky we were to have Beautiful and Dirty on the one album. The messiest, prettiest contradiction there ever was.

I don’t want to be one of those people who says “if that’s art then I could be an artist.” But. There were some sounds in here that made me think even I could make it as a musician.

There are a lot of songs on here that have never seen the light of day. I think that’s ok though because it sounded like Madonna heard them for the first time on the day she recorded them and then never again.

At least one song on this album was good enough to be in the Titanic Irish jig scene

Everything I wanted Hunky Dory to be and more

Does Herbie Hancock know that The White Lotus stole Watermelon Man for their intro?

I held out way too long to pop the five star 🍒 every rock album should have piano like this

My boyfriend is basically in green day, five stars!

If you’re going to commit, then commit! Do the whole thing in Spanish!

The simple pleasures of an album that goes for 30 minutes, where every song is what is says on the tin.

Pulp effortlessly proving that just because Britain is gloomy, Brit Pop doesn’t need to be. They should have been bigger than The Beatles IMO.

I watched 16 minutes of Wuthering Heights on the plane from Auckland to LAX and this album made me wish I’d seen a little more.

I will always play games.