Reviews by amanda

Huh. I'm not familiar with... Love :'(

Oop, just kidding, I've heard 'Alone Again Or' before! Good title. Good song, too. This is kind of like a Beach Boys - Kinks - Monkees vibe. Very listenable, but also an indie sensibility to the lyrics, which I like. Lotta painting people colors talk.

Highlights: 'Alone Again Or', 'Live and Let Live', 'The Good Humor Man He Sees Everything Like This'

Lowlight: 'Bummer in the Summer' (feels like we're putting on a little voice here)

Linguistic intrigue: too much to list! These guys get it!!

Absurd wiki quote: "According to legend, the house that the members of Love lived in had a red telephone, although the song lyrics do not relate to this." Informative!

Ooh, SPACE ROCK? No! The first line on Wiki says, "The album is held together by an outer-space theme", and yet this isn't considered space rock (or even space funk)! Ridiculous. There are plenty of bleeps and bloops, it should count. Maybe drums add negative space points.

Parliament is like Wilco: I know they're beloved by the cool kids (the online cool kids, I should say), but I never really got into them. Luckily this album is way more fun than Wilco. Another 3.5.

Highlights: the idea that three relevant "faults, defects or shortcomings" a person might have are "arthritis, rheumatism or migraines". Saying "David Bowie" like they do in the oft-referenced-by-me clip from that Mylo song ([buːi]).

Linguistic intrigue: 'Supergroovalisticprosifunkstication' is not the most expected compound. I would have gone 'Supergroovalisticprosifunkication', unless the "sti-" is meaningful. But I guess it does flow a little better. Phonology beats syntax every time :(

Just what I needed! I would have guessed this was 80s. Ocasek has a fairly unique voice (even though there are a couple others like it); Orr has a pretty generic voice (but I can't think of any quite like it). Mostly, I enjoyed listening. Would be a 3.5 on a scale with .5s.

Silly quote re: 'My Best Friend's Girl': "Ocasek later said the lyrics were not inspired by any personal incident, saying "Nothing in that song happened to me personally. I just figured having a girlfriend stolen was probably something that happened to a lot of people."" Oh??? Was it???

Riff ranking: 'Just What I Needed' (highlight) > 'Yummy Yummy Yummy' > 'Stacy's Mom'

Minor syntactic intrigue: "Always it's some other guy", "she never leaves on the light"

Unrelated meta comment: I'm so glad there's now a button to read random reviews! Dreams do come true!

Noooo. One Iron Maiden album was enough. Honestly, it's fine, I don't even hate it, but completely uninteresting to me.

Girl who just read about exotica: Is this... exotica?

Nope, it's just 80s rock. It's fine. At least I learned that there's a British place called "Tooting Bec".

Talvin Singh, have you met my good friend, Finley Quaye?

An album called "OK" has got to be impossibly hard to search for. I'm sure that's why I've never heard of it 'til now. "Exotica" is a weird name for a genre. Per Wiki, it refers to "tropical ersatz, the non-native, pseudo experience of insular Oceania, Southeast Asia, Hawaii, the Amazon basin, the Andes, the Caribbean and tribal Africa", which is, yeah, still extremely weird. Why would anyone self-identify as producing such? Also, Talvin here does seem to be Indian, so I'm not sure if this really applies. The vocals are a little bit ersatz, though. But otherwise I'd say this is "chill electro", maybe "electro-jazz". I like it fine but, given the genre, I wouldn't go around advertising that fact.

I was annoyed that it started with the 11minute 'Traveller', but actually the second half of it (the non-singing half) is really nice. I like the strings a lot. Very heterogeneous album, though. Some lovely bits, some embarrassing ones.

Wow, I watch Big Brother every summer (and one time there was an alliance called "The Moving Company"), yet I've never heard of this! Pretty wild! But I have heard of Janis Joplin (a.k.a. Janice from the muppets), and apparently this is a band she was in. Fine. In theory I like that the album cover is a comic, but in practice, I hate it very much. Other things I hate: "incorporated recordings of crowd noises to give the impression of a live album". Real live albums are bad enough, you don't need to laugh-track it!

All told, I like this a little better if I pretend it's Marge Simpson, but I still don't like it very much.

Highlights: 'Piece of My Heart', 'Turtle Blues'

This album cover really gives me all the relevant info. It's like a nice promo poster. I approve.

Mostly this sounds like oldies, in terms of the songs but also the sound quality. It's enjoyable but not something I would listen to on its own. I appreciate that all the songs are so short and energetic. They're also quite similar to each other, though.

Apparently, 'Ready Teddy' is also sang (sung?) by the Prisencolinensinainciusol guy!

Highlight: 'Slippin' and Slidin''

Nope, never heard of you guys. But as established, I like when a name is a sentence, and that includes band names. The album title makes it seem like the teardrop exploded Kilimanjaro.
Anyway, this sounds like some generic Britpop to me! Which I like. I also like the song title 'Ha Ha I'm Drowning' because it is good to laugh.

Still I had some questions about these tracks. Like:
-What is rafferty?
-What is AAP?

No time to research, though. British intrigue, will resolve another day!

Is this our first Metallica? Maybe so. Well, they belong on here, no doubt. The genre "thrash metal" is a bad omen*. Also the album cover. The songs are very long. I don't like the genre, but it seems fine for what it is. Is that a 2 or a 3? I don't know!!

Highlight: 'Leper Messiah'

* Is 'Orion' space thrash metal?

Finley Quaye is a good name for a made up friend. I've never heard of him. I'm curious about the intended parse of "Maverick A Strike". Is it a noun phrase?

This album was weird. Scottish reggae? Trip-hop? I'm leaving vaguely unsettled. But in terms of a rating: it was fine.

Highlight: 'It's Great When We're Together' (sounds kinda like... the background music in Persona 5)

A guy in my middle school who was big into Mormonism was also BIG into the Foo Fighters. But that isn't why I never got into them* (except for that one music video); it's because the vocals are soooo uninteresting. I guess to be fair they do have a distinct sound, but for whatever reason I don't care for it. Maybe because like Nickelback, all the songs sound the same. This album is just 'Learn to Fly' x12. Better than Led Zeppelin though.

*I say "them" but it turns out this is a bit of a Nine Inch Nails situation; it's really just Dave Grohl. Kudos to him (but also that makes a lot of sense).

Lowlight: 'Weenie Beenie'

I Have This Album (#9)! Not sure why, if I'm honest. As detailed previously, I remember seeing 'Money' on TV one time and thinking "this is the good stuff", but that song is not on this album. I guess you took what you could get back in those pre-mp3 BMG music club days!

Anyway, I haven't listened to it as much as my other albums, because I don't really like Pink Floyd that much. I didn't even know it was a concept album, or a rock opera. I do vaguely remember being confused about the multiple songs with the same name on my iTunes, which makes much more sense now that I'm forced to listen to the whole thing all in a row. Not as good a WWII-inspired album as Neutral Milk Hotel's. Slur count = 4.

Highlights: 'Another Brick in the Wall' Parts 2 + 3, 'Mother', 'Goodbye Blue Sky', 'Comfortably Numb', that there's a cute little sentence that starts at the end and ends at the beginning

There sure are a lot of bands I've never heard of! I guess I appreciate a rock(?) band with a female singer, and also a song called 'Charlie Big Potato' with some strings in. When I was a kiddo I had a book with some Anansi stories in it, so I like the band name too (and that they apparently added "Skunk" to "make the name nastier". Poor skunkos.) Slur count = 9.

Apparently 'Secretly' was in Cruel Intentions, which I've seen 8 million times, and yet it did not sound at all familiar. But hey, 2 adverb songs in a row! I don't know if this album got more mellow as I was listening, or if I just got sleepier, but it ended up being on the good side of average for me. We're on a solid streak here! Not quite a 4 though, I think.

Highlight: 'Cheap Honesty' (very 90s)

Neat. I like 90s chamber (brit)pop. You know you're eating good when there's both tuba and viola in the liner notes. The guy on this album cover (presumably the singer) looks an awful lot like a different guy whose name I can't recall. Too bad his voice is kind of unremarkable. The lyrics are obviously tongue-in-cheek, but I fear it's a bit of a Borat situation where some people will think "excuse me, sir????". Some similarities to 69 Love Songs, but not as eclectic or clever (imho), so ultimately it ended up being just "OK".

Rock 'n SOUL.... CRY to me... I see what's happening here.

This was better than I thought it'd be for a guy I never heard of. Sounds more like 50s than 60s, which I like. Very mellow, but not too sleepy. Nearly a 4.

Highlights: 'Cry to Me', 'You Can't Love Them All'

Is this "bad" meaning bad, or "bad" meaning good? Turns out to be the latter. Who knew every MJ bop* was on a single album?? Briefly considered a 5, but half of the songs are just all right, so I guess it's a 4.

*except 'Black or White'

Highlights: 'The Way You Make Me Feel' (every song in the classic film Center Stage is a precious gem, including this one!!!), 'Man in the Mirror' (reminds me of my college acapella group singing 'Heart of the Matter', another bop), 'I Just Can't Stop Loving You' (very "90s kids movie end credits song that they'd play in the grocery store" vibe), 'Dirty Diana' (admittedly I knew the Weeknd's version first, which I prefer, but this is still pretty good), 'Smooth Criminal' (admittedly I knew the Alien Ant Farm version first, but in a rare happening, I like this better)

Lowlights: 'Bad' (I think this may be the maximally bad song on the album, in fact!)

Wiki highlight:
<<"Bad" was originally planned as a duet between Jackson and Prince, after Jones suggested they record a song together. Prince said in 1997 that he declined because of reservations he had with the opening line of the song: 'Your butt is mine'.>> (understandable)

We love a guy whose name is a sentence. Album cover is bad though (scary). Very jangly music and gravelly singing happening here. Some elements of Nine Inch Nails (music), some of Nick Cave & Bruce (vocals), some of the White Stripes (rhythm). Seems like I would like it, but, I don't. Wish this were Tom Jones instead.

I wonder if 'A Little Rain' took some inspo from Les Miserables' 'A Little Fall of Rain', because they sure have similarities!

Highlight: 'I Don't Wanna Grow Up'

Noooooo. I wasn't sure about an 11 minute song, but I AM sure about this 18-minute song: it's bad. I understand that people who play guitar might like to listen to other people jam out &c, but I am not those people. The 10 minute song is much better, but maybe that's just because it's 8 minutes shorter. The 9 minute song is bad.

Just think, before I started this project, I didn't know a single thing about Yes. How good I had it then.

Highlight: 'Cord of Life' (not a song, but a part of a song... OK Mozart)

This is pleasant! Good energy, fun instrumentation. I dunno about an 11 minute song, but I guess that's jazz for you.

Highlight: 'My Lady'

Lowlight: 'Night Faces' (a fine song in itself, but sounds like the hold music of my medical center, thus mildly traumatizing)