Album Reviews

OK I fully get this The shredding is insane on this. Just the right level of boisterous without being too navel gazeY. Ozzy is brilliant and oozes cult leader. Also this album is funky as fuck, some killer baselines

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This felt like an angsty teenagers take on what love is. Lyrics are laughable (why talking about animals so much!?), vocals could be better but the instrumentation was ok

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Not that bad, but I never had enough patience for post punk

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Not a fan

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Yeh it’s influential and classical but I still think it’s A little outdated my fav track of this album is Taxman

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Ok

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Awww, the Monkees! My childhood favorites, I really enjoyed this

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This album was middle of the road at best. I didn’t totally dislike it, but more like background music, at least it was short.

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Very, very low three star. I think of this as less an album and more a vessel for the singles by GnR that everyone knows. A few extra points for breaking into the mainstreams and creating timeless classics.

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2/3. I actually kinda liked it. It does blend together a lot, but there are moments that jump out, and it was well-performed. Even if it's not really my thing, I can see how this would be a great vibe album, maybe on a late-night drive. Worth a listen if you've never heard, but I probably wouldn't revisit much.

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can’t hear clearly what he’s singing about, certainly not my vibe

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First time listening, very impressive work, never thought I’ve accepted it

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So confusing

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Okay so after watching the Diddy documentary, I kinda have to support the West Coast, even though Biggie is the best artist that came out of this war shit. Honestly, very significant album yes yes I see that. But then I ask myself the question: do I want to listen to a man rapping about his dick, his bitches etc? welllllll no not really. Beats are absolutely awesome tho, out of principal u get 3 stars sorry not sorry

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My favorite 2000s indie rock album!

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Slow night, so long - 3 King of the rodeo - 4 Taper jean girl - 4 Pistol of fire - 4 Milk - 3 The bucket - 4 Soft - 3 Razz - 4 Day old blues - 3 Four kicks - 4 Velvet snow - 3 Rememo - 3 Where nobody knows - 4

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I've never been a fan of Willie Nelson's voice, but his authenticity often makes up for it. The songs on this are solid and Willie is a national treasure.

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Really not my thing

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Boring

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A more country version Beatles

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The singing is sooo bad

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Chill Ray is the best Ray. I just wish those kinds of songs were more frequent. Favorite track: You Don't Know Me

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I was so unprepared for this shit, didn’t see anything worth listening to

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It's like if a theater kid with no taste liked David Bowie and took all of his dating advice from 80s movies.

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Not my favorite Leonard cohen album but I like it

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*1970. 2nd album. *Iggy Pop's voice is so distracting and unpleasant that I'm not sure how to rate the music. I think if someone covered this album, it might be pretty nice, but it's hard to say. RATING - 4/10

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…thought it was Beatles

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Meh. It was aight.

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3.7

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Not bad. Maybe a little too much Van Morrison, but the band sounded good, the recording was good, and the songs were pretty good. A better singer and this would be really good.

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Sounds rather dim-witted

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This is a fantastic, creative, smooth example of '70s singer-songwriter fare that holds up particularly well. It's like James Taylor but bluesy and more interesting, reminds me a lot of Jorma Kaukonen Quah. It's this kind of deep cut material that makes the OAD project so rewarding. The recording is also very good, though I wouldn't call it great. This album is completely chill but layered and textured enough to remain consistently interesting. My only complaint, and it is a small one, is that Martyn sometimes deliberately mumbles or slurs his words. I'm assuming this was an artistic choice. It makes more sense on the title track, as it fits the song's mood, which I understand was dedicated to Nick Drake, who died only a year and a half later. It's a bold choice to open a singer-songwriter album where lyrics are often the centerpiece of the music. The only time when I'm really disappointed is on the song "The Man in the Station." I really like the lyrics that I can understand, and I love the vocal reading. Better enunciation would have helped me to appreciate this track more; as is, it's a bit of a tease. Regardless of my minor complaints about the mumbled lyrics. I enjoyed at least three spins of this album, and I even listened to it again this morning. Four stars.

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There are 3 Morrissey albums on this list .. I am too far along to quit this thing now, but it is making it hard to continue

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The most important rock album of my generation.

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Another band I'd never heard of, but reading a little bit ahead of time I was excited to listen. It seemed they were likely one I'd enjoy. Overall I did. I got into the vibe right away, but only some of the songs stood out from the pack. Quite a few felt very similar so that didn't help. Also I would have loved listening with the lyrics in front of me, as I think that might've helped me to enjoy it more, but I was driving to work so that wasn't possible. The songs I really liked were Amateur Hour, Talent Is An Asset, and In My Family (loved the line "Gonna hang myself, from my family tree"). I will pay more attention to this band moving forward, as I know I'll like more of their stuff.

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Not listened properly so will come back to it

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I can see that someone might have appreciated the art of it, but I think it belongs somewhere between not on the list and Kid Rock. It's very chaotic and the lyrics sound like a mix of English, backmasked Arabic, and nonsense. The artsy-fartsy people who like this can keep it. There are moments where you get a few bars and think "Oh my, a bit of music I can hang onto", and then it gets interrupted with a goose-honking saxophone or a weird turn of phrase and you remember "Oh yeah, I'm listening to Robert Wyatt, not a sensible musician". Ending the album with that laugh sounds like he just pulled the biggest joke on all of us. Like... "I made the worst album I could think of and YOU ALL LISTENED TO IT." This is like the Voynich Manuscript of albums. My Rating: 0/5, but I have to put a 1.

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We've had a lot of "this is fine" type albums lately.

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No more new wave/punk plz

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Very solid 70s rock, with a little bit of dive bar grit. Breakthrough. Jam band. In Library of Congress as one of the most important albums. Long songs showing off the bands’ skills.

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Interesting album, not why I was expecting. I can see why maybe I’m amazed is the only song I knew. I’m not typically one for instrumental tracks but it kind of worked here. And the last track is definitely something.

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Some of the most wonderful songs… fox in the snow, if you’re feeling sinister make this a 4 star album alone

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I listened to this album so much as a kid. My parents had it on all the time. Weird Al's "Fat" is burned into my brain. Trying to focus on the actual music this time, Bad is much more synth heavy and electronic than I remember. Guess I was way closer the the 80s back then than I am today. Like, "Speed Demon" is so wild. It's still fun but not quite the masterpiece I remember it being when I was young. I liked several of the songs that I had kind of glossed over as a kid, and some of the ones I used to love didn't do it for my anymore. Standouts are "The Way You Make Me Feel" "Liberian Girl" and "Smooth Criminal" Overall I'd say Bad sounds a little cheesy today. Still full of classics, but it's definitely aged. A very solid 4/5 for me.

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Not my thing. Very spacy and ethereal, but also not super interesting. It's like the music that plays in the background of a B-level early '00s movie about kind aliens or something. Definitely not one for me to seek out, but not offensive.

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A brilliantly shining example of perfectly average.

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Super meh - dont understand why this is on the list

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I did NOT need to hear another Supergrass album before I depart this mortal coil. Goddamn the Eurocentricity of this list. I'm gonna start my own 1001 album list with Wilco's discography, and The National's discography, and hookers and blackjack....

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I actually kind of like this album. Looking into his history is even more interesting and it makes meo wish I spoke Portuguese. This album got the singer arrested and exiled from the country because his music was very much against the military regime.

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Kauniita klassikkokappaleita selkeän yksinkertaisesti sovitettuna, konstailematonta omalla tavallaan kaunista laulua, erinomaista torkkumusiikkia (hyvällä tavalla)

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BuT iT's CuLtUrAL aPpRoPriATiOn!!!!!111 Does anyone fucking think on here? Does anyone know what they're talking about? Does anyone know anything about music? There's a certain type of idiot on here (and in life) that hears something like Graceland and sprints, whistle in mouth, to declare Paul Simon guilty of "cultural appropriation." These are the people who were hall monitors in high school and continue to look for infractions anywhere and everywhere in life. According to these assholes, Paul Simon didn't collaborate with musicians in South Africa, he only extracted their music and their culture. And they constantly ignore (or don't want to bother to look) that the music that's on this album shined a light on artists like Barney Rachabane, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Hugh Masekela and Clifton Chenier. They don't want to take a minute to understand that this album brought these artists some notoriety and that these artists were appreciative. They don't want to admit, by these artists accounts, that the album was a joy to make. And these assholes just never want to acknowledge the most obvious point, that music has always been a conversation across cultures. Genres exist because cultures collide...rock music exists because of Black Americans. Elvis didn't appear out of thin air fully formed, he was drawing from Black gospel, blues and R&B. The Beatles were borrowing Chuck Berry riffs, girl group harmonies, basslines from Motown, American R&B, Indian sitars and the list goes on and on. Jazz is a mix of african rhythms, european brass band instruments, carribean influences and blues scales. Country is a blend of scottish and irish ballads, Black blues structures, mexican influences on Western swing and African banjo classics. Hip Hip was built on sampling funk, disco, rock and whatever else they could find. But the "cultural appropriation" assholes never worry about nuance. As long as they can plant their flag on some moral hill, they'll ignore everything else. They'll ignore the musicians that wanted to work with Paul Simon, the breaking of a cultural boycott in an effort to collaborate on music and the positive feedback from everyone involved. These "cultural appropriation" assholes have one argument, and it's this: Paul Simon shouldn't have made one of the best and most innovative albums of the 80s because it violates my sensitivities. In doing so, these "cultural appropriation" assholes flatten the South African musicians into props for a moral lecture. And in thinking they're somehow protecting them, it reduces them to passive objects rather than creative artists who wanted to collaborate with Simon and brought the world some fucking awesome music. The "cultural appropriation" assholes just ignore that music isn't pure and it's not supposed to be. Humans borrow from each other and cultures mix and to ignore it is to willfully ignore the way culture actually works. They want rigid boundaries when it suits them and they want rigid boundaries in art when art doesn't obey boundaries. So fuck the cultural appropriation warriors, this album absolutely slaps. If you want to downgrade it for farty bass lines and lyrics you don't like, that's fine. But if you want to get on your high horse and write a review about "cultural appropriation" while ignoring all the music you've 5 starred on this site and think you're some sort of a fucking genius you might want to sit this one out.

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I guess I just don't get it. I don't know why we have so many Nick Cave albums on here. Is he interesting? At times. Murder Ballads was ambitious and intriguing, a worthy inclusion. That said, he is very far from great. Want proof? He is revered by a good amount of critics (mainly English), as evidenced by having 5 albums on this list. And yet, here in the States, he has had one album that has sold more than 100k copies. One. That's incredibly hard to accomplish. Is he a complicated artist that is just misunderstood in the US? Perhaps. Or maybe, just maybe, he's a relatively uninspiring/bad signer, who is a lackluster song writer. Some examples, just from this album: "We'd buy the Sunday newspapers and never read a single word." "I don't believe in an interventionist God but I know, darling, that you do." "In a colonial hotel, we fucked up the sun and then we fucked it down again." He's incredibly trite throughout this record. Him trying sing layers about a "twinkling cunt"? Huh? Worse yet, this collection of songs are very basic with zero real musicality to them. The only bonus is that I've now burned through more than half of his albums on this countdown. Only two more to get rid of. While he hasn't supplanted Amy Winehouse as my least favorite artist on this countdown, I realize now I would rather listen to her than him. At least Amy had an excellent voice and talent, even if she totally wasted both. This dude is predominantly just a waste of time.

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Fucking transphobic moron. The fuck is that cover. Stupid cunt.

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I’m vibing with the lesbian twang

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When this came up as my album of the day I was less than thrilled. This isn't what I want for Sunday morning dog walking in the cold rain and snow. Well, I couldn't have been more wrong. This is outta sight. Who knew I would enjoy downtempo electro dance pop so much? Quick aside, I try to not call people out for their reviews but come the fuck on, comparing her cover of American Pie to war crimes and human rights violations. It's a 4 minute version of a folk rock classic, not dropping bombs on women and children. Criminy, take a breath and actually listen to what you're saying. But anyway, this is another prime example why Madonna has been one of the most successful artists of all time.

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Based Oliver Cromwell.

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Fuck this rapist midget and every scumbag who enabled him.

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"I started to play the song yesterday, and stopped myself. Again, I was angry. Again, another story about the blues of Pharaoh, and the people are invisible. The people are always invisible. "These motherfuckers," I mumbled to myself." -Ta-Nehisi Coates, about 'The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down'

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This shit slaps, just like I heard it when I was in high school. I remember I had a cassette tape someone burned for me, it was like 74 minutes on each side. One side was this album, the other side was Evil Empire. But plant me smack in the middle of the group of people that didn't pay attention to their politics or care about them. I just liked the anger, the guitar...it is music to have on while you're lifting and working out. It's just hard to take their politics seriously and it was hard to take their politics seriously back in the day. I remember some magazine article where these guys were out golfing...the hypocrisy was just evident from the start. And while I'm sure these guys really believe the shit they're yelling about, they're just cartoons. They built their identity and messaging on anti-capitalism and anti-corporate power while becoming hugely profitable, major label stars that sold out arenas. They Raged Against corporate exploitation and then sold tickets through Ticketmaster and Live Nation at prices that the working class couldn't afford. Yeah, they've donated money, yeah they protested Ticketmaster at one point but at the end of the day they used the system. They signed with a massive corporation in Sony and always claimed some bullshit along the lines of "we're using their money to spread anti-capitalist ideas" which was just fucking hysterical. Sony didn't sign these guys because of their ideological messages, they did it cause RATM made them a shit ton of money and you don't subvert capitalism by becoming a platinum selling band inside of it. Morello lives a really comfortable, elite life. The rest of the band members do, too, but he's a bit above the rest. It doesn't invalidate their beliefs but it's hard to take their moral high ground seriously. There's no personal sacrifice here. In their own way, they're completely safe. They felt somewhat dangerous in the 90s and were always loud and angry about US imperialism, capitalism and policing. They are quiet on authoritarian left-wing regimes, labor abuses in countries that are aligned with their preferred politics and censorship when it comes to their side. I will admit that they've donated millions to activist causes they believe in, they've platformed radical politics since the start, they've never pretended to be neutral on anything and I think they've read the books they put in their albums instead of pretending. That all said, the self awareness is lacking. They exist inside of capitalism but they think they're morally superior while they rage from the penthouse that overlooks the machine. It's a band that rallied around being dangerous to power but always embraced it when it suited them best. Now... what they should have done was adopt the philosophy of Ian MacKaye. MacKaye didn't just say anti-corporate things, he designed his entire life and career around never having the message and behavior drift apart. MacKaye is the anti-RATM. No major labels. Ever. He never had to explain that contradiction because he never got there to begin with. He capped ticket prices for decades. Never gave in to festivals...it was always 5 bucks. It was a moral obligation and he never strayed from it....and he never needed Ticketmaster. Yet, he still sold hundreds of thousands of records. Toured a shit ton. Influenced a lot of bands. He never went to sell out arenas, he never made the luxury leap, he never bought the big house and the fancy car. MacKaye's politics weren't slogans that he tapped into whenever he felt like he needed to...it was DIY or don't do it, keep prices low for all ages shows, no corporate sponsorships, no gouging on merch. He just opted out of the system/machine instead of trying to play some sort of a game that RATM did. RATM chose maximum reach, mass culture reach...MacKaye chose sheer autonomy and limits. Neither of these ways are invalid or bad, but one avoids hypocrisy completely. If RATM went the MacKaye way, fewer people would have heard them, they might not have been icons and they wouldn't have filled arenas. But no one could roll their eyes at them. So...yeah, I hate their politics. I'm not reading Howard Zinn, I'm not reading Marx, or Guevara or Alinsky or Chomsky primarily because the people suggesting it in 1996's Evil Empire make me roll my eyes. So why am I giving this a 5? It's music to lift weights to. As much as they don't want to be lumped into this category, it's music for football players and they had to have known that when they were making it but they did it anyway. It's great rock music, maybe even slightly innovative rock music, it takes me back to a time where I'd blast this album, not give a shit about their politics, understanding that the guys were making the music were hypocrites and realizing that most people are. And that's the lesson to be learned from RATM, it's not revolution...the lesson to learn from RATM is that most people are hypocrites.

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Murderer, rapist turd.

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Album No. 0125 on my list. There it is. Pink Floyd's "The Dark Side Of The Moon". THE album. My hypothesis is that if you ask people to think of a music album, this may well be the one that's mentioned the most. It is certainly one of the most iconic albums of all time, and possibly the greatest rock album there is - certainly the greatest progressive rock album, and maybe the greatest album of the 70s. I have to admit that it's also one of my favorite albums (what a cliché, I know). It's just not possible for me to judge this objectively in any way, but I guess based on the other ratings of this album on this page, many others seem to like the album as well. I guess "The Dark Side of the Moon" perfectly hits the sweet spot between a complex, progressive, artsy work on the one side and a groovy, catchy, enjoyable album on the other side. It is more than a collection of 10 songs, they all fit together just so nicely. And even more than 50 years later, the album still sounds incredibly great! For nostalgic reasons, I didn't even listen to any of the remasters but to the original, and it still sounds very good. The prodcution was really aehad of its time. The album really has everything. You've got some or Roger Water's greatest lyrics on this ("Time", "Money", "Brain Damage"), some of David Gilmour's greatest guitar work ("Time", "Money"), and singing ("Breathe", "Time"), some of the greatest Pink Floyd atmospheric sound layers ("Time", "Us And Them"). In addition, you got one of the greatest album covers of all time, possibly even the most iconic one ever made. You got some progressive elements (odd time signatures, some extensive instrumental parts), but it really never gets boring. Everything is perfectly nuanced, everything is timed to perfection. To avoid adding the full album to my playlist, I'm leaving out the instrumentals, but will still add "Breathe", "Time", "The Great Gig In The Sky", "Money", "Us And Them", "Brain Damage", and "Eclipse" to my playlist. If any record is a hallmark record, it's this one. I can't praise this enough, would have given 50 stars if I could. 5/5 stars - of course!

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I can’t believe the top review for this record (as of Dec 2023) is from someone trying to use their PhD in Mathematics as justification for not liking hip-hop. Weak.

Oh fuck yeah, now we're talking. Wait no, I swear I'm not being pretentious. This is the lowest rated album on this site because I guess mostly people aren't very fond of German people smashing metal plates together - who would have guessed. But halle-fucking-lujah, this is something this list needs more of. Albums that make you go "well, that was an experience and now I'm a changed man". Nobody is lying on their deathbed wishing they heard more crappy 80s post-punk or late 60s psychedelic rock. THIS is what we all deserve to be listening to as we embrace eternal oblivion. I'm giving this a high rating not only because I genuinely really love it, but also to help Kid Rock move to his rightful place as the actual worst album on this list. Together we can make a difference. Save the turtles.

Brings back vivid memories of when me and my mate Ray went on a trip to Dresden. We met this rotund goth in a bar, head to toe with tattoos and piercings, real filth and after a while took her into the disabled bogs for a spit roast. We were both pumping away in her with Napalm Death on in the background and her wailing "MEIN GOTT" at the top of her lungs. I remember spaffing all over her back just as Siege of Power kicked in. As i shoot over her, she takes Ray's cock out of her gob and says "do you want fries with that?" in a faux American accent. Anyway, we go outside and there's this gammy little geezer in a wheelchair sitting there furious, giving me daggers, because he's had to wait so long, so I lean into him and I go "I hope you have as much fun in there as we just did you little cunt".

Back when I was in college I used to go to a bar and listen to Neil tunes and do magic tricks for women. There was a bartender there, he was the best. I loved that guy. Some of the best years of my life.

Shit like this on the list is both refreshing and infuriating. Refreshing because it is good, fun, interesting, and also not something I would regularly be exposed to! It's why I started this project and keeps me coming back. It's infuriating because the fact that it is included here means that Robert Dimery, the original author of the 1001 albums list is aware that music like this exists. He's clearly aware that there is an entire world of music out there. SO WHY HAVE I LISTENED TO 200 80s BRITISH NEW WAVE ALBUMS AND 200 SCOTTISH ROCK ALBUMS FROM THE 90S??!!?

Back when I was in college, there was this dude who would come into the bar I worked at on a Friday night and play fucking 10 Neil Young songs in a row. He would also hit on girls by doing magic tricks. I remember how angry I got every time he made me listen to an hour of Neil Young because I was just trying to have a good time, and he fucking made me listen to this sad, soppy fuck who writes nothing but songs that sound indistinguishable from each other and never seemed to enjoy a happy moment in his entire like. Fuck that guy, and fuck Neil Young. 2/5

Sorry Boomers/Gen X, I was like 20 when this came out so it's one of the best things to ever happen to me. Sorry it's not King Crimson or whatever.

Rap isn't my preferred genre of music. But I'm a shitty mathematician so I enjoyed this.

I really don't get rap, and I am completely aware of why. I'm a STEM guy, specifically a Ph.D. student in mathematics. Although my verbal intelligence is quite high, it's still about a standard deviation below my quantitative intelligence. Therefore, it should not be too surprising that I prefer melodies to lyricism, and that a genre based on the latter doesn't wow me. I know I'm pretty far out of step with public opinion on this one, but that can easily be attributed to the fact that hipsters with humanities degrees (i.e. extremely verbal-dominant people) are considered the ultimate arbiters of taste for some reason. (Side note: this also explains why prog rock is seen as being for losers.) Best song: Be (Intro), which had a decent instrumental part at the beginning. Everything else just sort of ran together.

Music for incels to wank furiously by

The only enjoyment I got from this was reading the review about the brothers in Dresden and their lovely and talented tattooed friend.

Rage In Favor Of The Machine.

i ain’t listening to all that i’m happy for u tho or sorry that happened

Most 60's groups had three choices: copy the beatles, copy the beach boys, or sexually abuse minors. These guys changed the game and did all three- Four stars!

The only reason this is here is because it’s from before streaming, when if you bought a shit album you had to convince yourself you liked it.