abitfishy

This has a real nice mellow R&B border-lining some jazz fusion-y stuff. I've never heard of D'Angelo's music apart from the song he did for Red Dead Redemption 2, so it was nice to finally hear what all the craze is about him. Some songs seem like they were made to infect your ears, "Lady" is a notable culprit of this, with that bass motif doing the most damage to me.

I found this album a bit difficult for my brain to understand. This smooth soul is a bit out of my usual listening habits, though I can at least tell it's done very well.

Highlight Song/s: "Smooth" and "Lady"

Portishead's first album Dummy combines crushing hip-hop beats and hip-hop-like sampling with soft, mellow and lonesome female vocals, with jazzy moments sprinkled around. It's surprisingly a huge success of combing quite different sounds together. "Numb" and "Biscuit" seem to foreshadow a bit of the oppressive, noisy, wickedness that the self-titled album has, which they'd release a couple years later on from this one. If I had to pick one song that captures the album feel entirely I think it would be "Wandering Star," it has the shaky, vulnerable vocals with this ominous motif that repeats ad nauseum.

Highlight Song/s: "Mysterons", "Sour Times", "Strangers", "Wandering Stars", "Roads" and "Biscuit"

The Kinks album is centred around this guy called Arthur and his living predicament. It has all that classic snappy British wit and deadpan humour to attack certain things like complacency in society and war. Speaking of war I believe this has some of the best anti-war music/lyrics ever in recorded music history. The narrative takes you on a journey and allows the listener to immerse themselves into Arthur and his story. It eventually pays off so well once you get to the final song.

An example of a lyric that attacks complacency is in the song "Brainwashed":
"You've got a job and a house
And a wife and your kids and your car
Yeah, you're conditioned to think
What they want you to think and be happy to be where you are
Yes you are
Get down on your knees
Get down on your knees"
That is so punk!

I had such a good time with this album, I'd recommend it time after time.

Highlight Song/s: "Yes Sir, No Sir", "Brainwashed" and "Mr. Churchill Says"

I found this one really violating to my ears nearly unilaterally committed by the vocals. How did no one convince the lead singer maybe don't intentionally try to sing badly? The jangly instrumentation otherwise is fine/okay and is just typical of the time.

I'm not keen whatsoever if I had to listen to this album again. if I was being interrogated by the CIA - or by whoever - in Guantanamo Bay and they played this stuff? I'd tap out so, so fast.

It's a pass from me, I didn't enjoy it at all.

The album is very folk-oriented with psychedelic elements, I find it has very odd melodies and hooks, which I find charming.

Spence's vocals apart from the first song were a bit off-putting, just how bass-y it is, combined with a Bruce Springsteen-like groan vocals to words is probably what did me in (though I love Springsteen's voice, just maybe not Spence's inflection.)

How the instruments were done are quite odd and eccentric, but I find I liked it most of the time (apart from the obviously weird 60s panning choices.)

This album sold so poorly that Columbia deleted it from their archives is crazy overkill for this album. It also put Spence off of music altogether.

I'm a bit ambivalent about this one, I think its' very sweet and it's heartbreaking what Spence went through to make this and what resulted from the creation of this album. I believe 3 stars best represents my feelings.

Highlight Song/s: "Little Hands"