Reviews by amanda

I guess if my choices are live album or dead, I'll take live album, but it's a harder decision than you'd think.

What does Wiki have to teach us about this album? "The title has a double meaning. It refers both to the band (the "Dead") playing live, and is an oxymoron, contrasting the two words in apparent contradiction." Fascinating...

I mostly know Jerry Garcia from his work in the ice cream sphere, but now I will know him as a guy who made a live album with a 23 minute song. This is like jazz but with some old timey singing and double the length. I think it'd be fine if all the songs were 3 minutes, but they are very much not, so its noodlyness annoys me.

Language observation: I may have said this already (forgive me), but the notion of a "lovelight" comes up a weird amount in songs, and although wiki tells me it's indeed a long-attested word, I never hear it in modern day writing/speech (outside of music).

Very Low Lowlight (the anti-lovelight): 'Feedback' !! (was gonna give this album a 2 until I got to this one, really one of the worst songs possible)

Never heard of this group. I bet that's not even their real address.

Apparently they had a bit of a Fleetwood Mac situation, and this was their last album. One of their members is a 60s Amanda, which is pretty rare. Good for her. Some out of pocket harmonica going on. All the tracks were pleasant, but nothing super stood out to me. A moderately good 3.

More 70s English bands..... they even have "bad" right in the name!

This sounds more "oldies" mixed with the band 'Europe' than "70s", though, which is good. I rate them: middling company.

I suppose 4 artists I've heard of in a row would be too much to ask. Back to another British band from the 70s I've never heard of! At least they're a new genre... prog jazz. (silent screaming)

To be fair, prog jazz is better than prog non-jazz, but still worse than non-prog jazz and also worse than 60 other genres. Ah well, what can you do. Somehow they played at the BBC Proms (in 1970); glad I wasn't around for that one!

Okay... actually, this album gets better as it goes along, or maybe I'm just sleepier. 1 is the worst track, then 2, then 3, and then by 4 I was like "wait, do I like this?". Was gonna give it a 2 but I'll bump it up to a 3 for the growth arc.

Nice! 3 days in a row of artists I'm familiar with... maybe I'll even like this album. Life IS a mystery. Everyone MUST stand alone. I like that song a lot, and 'Beautiful Stranger' (from Austin Powers), but none of the other Madonna stuff really got its hooks in me. This sounds surprisingly similar to the pop girlies of the late 90s though (Britney, Mandy Moore, etc), which I like well enough. Not quite enough for a 4 though.

Highlights: 'Like a Prayer', the possible double ellipsis in "Our luck_i is running out of time / You're not in love with me anymore / I wish that it_i would change but it_i won't [change] / If you don't [change(?)]"

Lowlights: 'Promise to Try' (zzz), wiki tells me Madonna "cited 'Cherish' as one of the most "retarded" songs she had written" (...)

Ha! A good Limp Bizkit followup, I guess. Talk about taunting me with the idea I could be listening to Nine Inch Nails instead, though!!! What's next, the social network soundtrack?!

I am now learning for either the first or 500th time that Marilyn Manson is a band and not (just) a dude. I'm pretty sure the dude is problematic though ((checks wiki)....yep). Too bad because this is an extremely nostalgic sound. I know it's loud, and there's even yelling and guitar, but it's generally a low enough pitch(?) that I find it all comforting rather than annoying. Like brown noise, or something. This is probably like a 3.5 for me, but since it is strictly worse than every NIN album, I'll give it a 3.

Slur count = 4.

Highlights: the music :'), 'The Beautiful People', 'Minute of Decay', 'The Reflecting God', the Apple PlainTalk voice (I miss her) :'')

Lowlights: the lyrics (lol edgy to the max... lotta rape talk..)

L...ol?

On the plus side, it's a band I know, but I can't help think there MUST be better options. And 'Nookie' isn't even on this album! Though on the plus side, neither is 'Behind Blue Eyes'. Instead they're taunting me with the idea I could be listening to Nine Inch Nails instead. :<

Apparently 'Take a Look Around' was in Mission Impossible 2, which is appropriate because that's one of the 2 movies I've fallen asleep in the theater for. The second version of 'Rollin' (the OG one, I guess) is better than the first one, but both are bad.

Slur count = 12.

Highlights: Dated 00s shoutouts to "Shockwave" (that's pre-Adobe Flash!), Xtina, Fight Club, and BSB; "Every single second I'm alive, I'm a mess" (me too Freddy)

Lowlights: (gestures expansively)

I assumed we had this band before, but we didn't actually! They're just very generic sounding. I wish they were tellin' stories, but they mostly weren't (unless they're very short abstract stories). I guess that's why they're called The Charlatans.

Ah yes - I remember Love.

I liked their last album, but this one starts (and ends) in a way that makes me question my past self. It does have some decent songs in the middle though. Also, there sure are a lot of songs out there called '[Adj] Sky(s)'.

Highlight: 'She Comes in Colors' (which is crucially NOT the same song as 'She's a Rainbow', which is confusing)

Lowlight: 'Revelation' (aaaaa)

Rejoice! It's a band I know. Another frequent flyer on the MTV2 Rock Countdown, although I didn't really like them that much (I'd say: more than the Mars Volta and Cyprus Hill, less than Incubus, for those keeping track).

They do have a distinctive sound, which I guess is a pro. A little bit Boomhauer-coded. The songs are also short, and the album is too. But the lyrics are kinda ???, and I don't just mean the delivery.

Slur count = 3.

Highlight: 'The Bucket'

I don't like 90s hip hop, but maybe 2006 hip hop will be more my speed.

Turns out: nope.
Major themes: violence, drugs, women (negative). The beats are more interesting than 90s stuff, though the delivery is less melodic. Had to search out some of the missing tracks, mostly all the "Iron Man" related ones, which was annoying. Lyrical content definitely not my speed. I wasn't mean to join the [[[Wu-Tang Clan] Fan] Clan].

(Bilingual) slur count = 110.

Highlights: Some good vowels. The track with Kanye (alas) and Ne-Yo, 'Back Like That'.

Hm, does Bruno Mars reference this line in 'Uptown Funk'?: "Sometimes I look in the mirror and want to kiss myself, I'm so pretty"

Yoooo. Like the Beastie Boys, Cypress Hill were inexplicably on the Rock Countdown all the time, even though they definitely aren't rock (Wiki backs me on this). I think host Jim Shearer was just a big fan. Anyway, I didn't like them at all. They had one song that went, "What's Your Name? What's Your Number? I would like to get to know you" and it gets stuck in my head about once a week. Via hate-filled mockery I have stockholmed myself into liking it. Anyway, this album vastly predates that song, so I'm curious if I will (a) like it due to familiarity, (b) hate them passionately as I did before, or (c) not even recognize them as the same band.

Well... it was (b) and (c)! Very 90s album, and 90s hiphop has been universally not my vibe so far. Themes on the album include classics like: gun violence, cops are bad, drugs. The beats&delivery were fine, not the worst but certainly not good enough to make me not hate the content. The lyrics were, for the most part, unpleasant.

(Bilingual) slur count = 14.

Highlights: "homepigs", a positive view of bilingualism

Metallica are certainly big, so I can't be too mad at it. This album cover is also intriguing. Will there really be an orchestra?
Apparently, yes, as "S&M" here stands for "Symphony and Metallica". (Somebody tell Rihanna!)

The professional reviews for this album are weirdly low for the list (a lot of 5-6/10s)! And oh no... it's a double album. More like M&M. At least it's the weekend.

Oh no oh no -- it's a live album!? If the crowd would shut up, I would like this album so much more, because I really like orchestras, even if I'm 50/50 on Metallica. Maybe one reason I like orchestras so much is that usually people aren't cheering in the middle of a song. A good long applauding at the end of a song, sure, but during?? Have some decency!! This isn't a comedy show!!

This album also feels like cheating, because it's got songs from a bunch of their earlier albums. What sort of magic loophole allows for Metallica to get a best-of album on here? Live-ness? Boy howdy. OK, OK, down to business.

Highlights: 'The Ecstasy of Gold' (minus the cheering), the orchestra, 'No Leaf Clover', 'Wherever I May Roam'

Lowlights: The cheering, the crowd singing, the clapping

Apropos of something: there was a time (mid-2000s?) when String Quartet Tribute to X albums were wildly popular. That was a good time. Feels like strings kinda fell off nowadays.

If it weren't live, this album might actually get a 4 from me. Alas: 3.

If they made a version of this list where each artist only had one album, it'd be like, 107 albums You Must Hear Before You Die. Hmph, harumph.

Nothing against CHIC though. They're fine. I kinda assumed they were a one hit wonder with 'Le Freak', but now I'm learning they did 'Good Times' too, which is probably even more successful (unfortunately, so successful that I find it overplayed and don't really want to hear it any more!). It's a good song, but very repetitive and also 8 minutes. Actually, all of these songs are very repetitive. Probably good for dancing, but not so great for intent listening.

Aaaaaaaaa

I don't even like Beatleses 'Helter Skelter', but I sure don't like this one, too.

I rounded their last album up to a 3 because of their influence, but they don't need 2 albums on here, so this one gets a 2. Sorry Siouxsie.

Got excited for a second because I thought this was Queen. Ah well. Instead it's some sort of Gorillaz-adjacent concept album. Sounds like a chiller Goriller, therefore: mid.

The Good: '80's Life'

Still no Mezzanine - and would they really have 3 Massive Attack albums on here? - but I'm happy to see this. This album cover is very distinctive.

This one seems more -hop than trip-. Though it's pretty mellow. It's nice, especially the female vocalist's tracks, but I don't know if I'd add any of these songs to my rotation. Maybe I should give it a go another time when I'm in a more chill mood.

This is the band of Frank Zappa! In all honesty, I don't know who Frank Zappa is, except that (1) Weird Al did a song based on him and (2) his kid is named Moon Unit, and they are usually credited with popularizing the "Valley Girl" sociolinguistic stereotype (except nowadays, most students have never even heard of this stereotype, so really I can throw out all my Frank Zappa knowledge).

It seems Frank Zappa is a pretty weird guy. Good for him, I guess, but I'm not getting anything from listening to this. Maybe you had to be there. I bet he inspired Maureen from "Rent".

The National are a natural class with The Antlers, Wilco, Band of Horses, and other bafflingly popular hipster artists I never got into. Oh, and Sufjan, who's in the background on one of these tracks. Here is their one and only chance to win me over!!

Nah, they didn't do it. If only they could convey one (1) emotion when singing. Otherwise they're fine. Keep 'em in the Grey's Anatomy background.

Highlights: 'Sorrow', 'Afraid of Everyone'

Hell's bells, Trudy!

Is it better to have an album you know you don't like, or one you've never heard of? Just curious. Apparently this is the 2nd best selling album of all time. I do like it better than Led Zeppelin, I think, as it's a little more zippy, but it's definitely in that "genre I hate" space. Except they're Australian! I also don't think I knew the context that one of their bandmates died before this album. I guess I will round to a 3 since it was less painful than I expected.

Slur count = 1.

Highlight: 'You Shook Me All Night Long'