Reviews by amanda

More REM! I'm not mad at it, although I am mad that the album called "Green" doesn't have a green album cover. Like with Sinatra, I like the overall sound a lot, but there are no standout tracks on this album. The people* want another 'Nightswimming'!

*me

Some of my best friends are Swingin' Lovers!

I assume there are no musical soundtracks on this list, so maybe this is the closest we'll get (based solely on the album cover). Not enough popular songs have a full orchestral accompaniment. Plus, such clear vocals! The songs themselves are whatever, but the performance is great. (Yes, I do have Michael Bublé albums, what about it?)

I could not believe there was a song on here called 'Makin' Whoopee', but it turns out the Newlywed Game meaning actually came *after* this song, not before, and it used to just mean "to enjoy oneself in a boisterous manner".

Highlight: 'Anything Goes'

Three Nick Drakes, huh? It's very peaceful and infinitely better than Wilco, but even so, we get the picture. At least this one is space rock. (A little joke for my fans.)

I think I considered getting this album a long time ago, because I really like the singles 'Somebody to Love' and 'White Rabbit', but then I learned the lead vocals weren't always Grace Slick and lost interest. I still like those songs, but the rest of the album feels fuzzy and old. Not bad, just not interesting to me. Also, what's up with (Jefferson) Starship? That's some confusing CSNY type stuff. Also, the one-two punch of 'Somebody to Love' - 'My Best Friend' is calling out for a double Queen mashup!!

Highlights: 'Somebody to Love', 'How Do You Feel', 'White Rabbit'

We love a British idiom one might find in housing advertisements. I've never heard of The Jam, but their stuff sounds kinda like the opening credits for a 90s TV show. Not a bad thing at all, just a little schmaltzy. I never would have pegged this as a 70s album, and that's a huge compliment.

Highlight: 'In the Crowd'

[tony vlachos voice]: this is huge; I needed this. Pleased to announce that I Have This Album (#6). I haven't listened to 'Rehab' since 2011 because I find it too upsetting, but 'Back to Black' (the song) is one of the greats. Amy has a strong jazzy voice that would be skilled-but-boring to me if the songs weren't zippy, but they (mostly) are, and that's why this album is a winner. Good job, list.

Kind of surprising to see the lyric "What kind of fuckery is this" in 2006, because it seems more modern than that (at least among whiteos). More validation for my "2006 was like, three years ago" mindset.

Highlights: 'Back to Black', 'Tears Dry on Their Own', 'Addicted'

We meet again, Bob Marley. Not much changed with you since last time, I see. No worries. Keep doing what you're doing.

When we had The Fugees' version of 'No Woman, No Cry', I was surprised to read that according to Wiki,
<<The lyric is sometimes misunderstood outside Jamaica to mean "if there is no woman, there is no reason to cry" >>
but I asked around and indeed that's how many people interpret it! Are they just not listening to the rest of the lyrics ("everything's gonna be alright")? But I guess what's happening here is that exposure to Jamaican dialects is not that high, and we have a really strong grammatical filter for whatever dialects we know (c.f. me, marvelling at British pronunciations every few days), such that we don't even search for alternatives. Pretty cool if you think about it. Like, X makes no sense, but it's all I know, so it must be X.

I guess so. Very British: "take care of [clause]", [beɪ.bl̩]. Like Moby meets Depeche Mode meets The Bible. It's OK.

Highlight: 'Give It Up'

Not as good as the other Verve album... bit of a snoozer.

Never heard of this, but!, I was just talking about s(c)hm-reduplication in class last week, so it's nice to see it appear In Real Life (with the trademark dismissive connotation - something most of my students have reportedly never heard).

Now in a way, aren't all albums conceived as a soundtrack to an imaginary film? This particular imaginary film doesn't seem very good though. Like, it's not quite a musical, but surely way too much singing for a non-musical. Maybe the soundtrack to Emilia Pérez?

I don't want to be too much of a hater, because I like Atticus Ross. But I don't think this is his best work. Some nice atmospheric bits, but also some "what are we doing here" bits, and that goes for both halves of the album. I do like the variety of vocalists.

Highlight: 'Achieved in the Valley of Dolls'

The album cover is compelling. I feel I have worn at least 3 of those outfits. Planets, Moon,...is this space rock? (Space art pop?) Like Cat Stevens, these vocals are kinda funny, but I think that's intentional (I assume that's what they mean by "kitsch"). Weirdly, I think the bass is my favorite part. There's a lot of listing in these lyrics -- listing girl's names, listing animals, listing planets. Some annoying noises at points though.

Highlights: pronouncing "Mavis" as [mɑvɪs], the song title 'There's a Moon in the Sky (Called the Moon)' (and honestly therefore the song, because that's just an insane lyric (in a good way), and they do say it in the song)

Lowlight: 'Downtown' (don't do Petula like that >:()

Aha, another album cover I recognize from being in a lot of people's top albums. The first true prog album, is it? And yeah, I hate it. So that tracks. It does sound more modern than it is (70s perhaps), I'll give 'em that. I've heard '21st Century Schizoid Man' before (because of Kanye, no doubt) but never knew those were the lyrics. Because the vocals are not crisp and clean! But at least the lyrics are interesting, I guess. And there are some interesting bits of jazzy instrumentation. I see why people like it. I don't like it, but maybe hate is too strong. It's fine. It's whatever. It's a low 3.

Another rock countdown staple! They're not as hated-by-me as the Mars Volta, but not one of my favorites, either (I don't have this album, even digitally, and from 2005 I have a lot of albums). A lot of loud guitar/drum stuff, and the vocals aren't particularly appealing. Lotta shakers. I felt very defensive of Meg White because people made fun of her drumming so much, not that I know anything about what makes for good drumming. A lot of people also got confused about if Jack & Meg were married or siblings (a classic). And now they're neither!

'My Doorbell' deserves particular attention for being one of the most intrusive songs of all time. I think of it approximately once a week. One of my greatest song pet peeves is absurd repetition, which this has in droves (c.f. Avril rhyming "dead" with "dead" or the "sucking on a chili dog" youtube edit of Jack and Diane).

'Red Rain' sounds a lot like 'Blue Orchid', which I assume is intentional.

Yay, all the songs sound like 'Wild World'! A little funny, but also comforting. I like it. Just very clear vocals, zippy but un-noisy guitar, folky vibes but the actual content is kinda fluffy. It IS a wild world. Dare I say, shades of Children's Favorites. But I wish I were having a wee nap right now and these charming lullabies aren't helping. Still I haven't given a 4 in forever, so let this be the one.

Cool album cover. Reminds me of BB Comics. That's probably the best part of this album, though. I was torn between a 2 and 3, but it has good energy and didn't drag, so I'll go 3.

Hooray, an artist I've heard of! I've never actually listened to this album though. 'Let's Go Crazy' sure sounds like Footloose. 'Computer Blue' sounds like Kokomo at the beginning. The concept of the "Filthy Fifteen" (of which 'Darling Nikki' is one) made me lol. I knew about it (thanks to Eminem's 'White America') but I never looked at the list before. Let's just say my own "here are 15 problematic songs!!!" list would be a BIT different, even in 1984. This was a very solid album (and very 80s), but it's not quite a 4 for me.

Highlights: 'Take Me with U', 'When Doves Cry'

More unknown-to-me recent indie? Hmm. Well, it's alright. Not noisy or annoying, but doesn't have any particular unique features (vocally/musically/lyrically) to draw me in. Maybe some unpopular things are unpopular for a reason. Also, all of the songs are 50% too long.

I got excited reading about this band until I realised it's the same band I got excited about (and then disappointed by) not one week ago! Fooled again! Reviews compare them to Nick Cave or Cocteau Twins, and I guess I can see the elements there if I squint, but this is just so *noisy* I could never enjoy it. I still don't know if that's in part because I listened to this on Youtube and the sound is worse there... but I'm not about to go buy the album and find out. Because it's bad.

Maybe the song 'Don't Try Suicide' is actually about this album. Luckily I knew about all the 'Frankie Teardrop' screaming already, but that didn't make it any easier for my little brain (volume-wise I mean, the content is whatever (true about both the screaming and my brain)).

The first song is about a Marvel character, which is a nice change from all the Gandalf songs on this list. All the non-screaming songs are fine, but didn't thrill me. 3 in general, 1 for screaming, that's a 2.

Highlight: 'Johnny'

Lowlight: 'Frankie Teardrop' (don't yell at me!)

This is exciting: I really like what I've heard from The Knife, but I never looked into them further, so learning there's a whole associated solo act is cool. Unfortunately there's too many mouth noises happening in this first song and the rest are kinda dazey. So is the solo act better than the duo act? In this reviewer's opinion... no.

Highlights: 'Dry & Dusty', 'Keep the Streets Empty for Me'