Reviews by apollo

While everyone else is outside having fun listening to Dolly Parton (I can't since i have already done all her albums prior to this event day and i haven't made it to the user list so i can't do that one either) I have to stay inside and listen to Talking Heads 77. Jokes aside, this album is a pretty decent one. This is the only Talking Heads album on the list that was not produced by Brian Eno but i can say that the producers here did a solid job making an album from 1977 feel like a typical 80s album. I feel like some of the vocals did get a bit annoying but i don't think they were the worst thing. I think that this album is alright, just not all that special.
Best Song: Psycho Killer
Worst Song: Who Is It?
Side note: Time for the rankings of all the Talking Heads albums on the list:
1. More Songs About Buildings And Food
2. Remain In Light
3. Talking Heads 77
4. Fear Of Music

Atomizer is an album that's certainly on the weirder side of things and like Pelican West, a weird one to get for a milestone album (that being 900 albums). This album feels pretty reminiscent of stuff like Sonic Youth by having the same noisy indie rock sound that their music also has. The main thing holding this album back is the guitars, they sound incredibly tinny and get pretty grating in most of the songs. However, i still see a vision with this album. I kinda like the Sonic Youth vibe that it has going on and it also had some interesting ideas when it came to the songs. It wasn't the most well executed album but i can appreciate it for what it was trying to do.
Best Song: Strange Things
Worst Song: Cables (Live)

I tried to find a 5 star album with The Good, The Bad & The Queen but no matter how hard i tried, i just couldn't find it, but i can find a very high 4 star album here. This band has members from Gorillaz, The Clash, The Verve, and Fela Kuti's Afrika 70 band but this album mainly just sounds like a Gorillaz album with a tinge of The Verve and vocals that are more akin to something i would hear in Blur. I really do like this styles as they made all these songs sound very melodic and helped each one of them have their own identity and many of them worked really well. This would have been a 5 star but due to some songs that didn't work very well for me, it's getting a rather high 4.
Best Song: Northern Whale
Worst Song: A Soldier's Tale

Another Music in a Different Kitchen is an album that i got really close to 5 starring but it just missed the mark. I have never heard of this band prior to doing this list but they still ended up sounding exactly like i expected them to sound. The music on offer is legitimately great as the guitars are hard and heavy exactly like i would expect them to be and exactly the way i like even when the last track got a bit on the weird side. The main thing dragging this album down from a 5 though is the vocals, they got incredibly grating pretty early on and while they weren't a complete dealbreaker for me, they still were enough to prevent me from 5 starring the album.
Best Song: Fast Cars
Worst Song: I Need

I was very much flipping back and forth between giving Urban Hymns a 4 or a 5 star rating but after enough thinking, i decided on the latter due to many reasons. I only knew this album from one of it's singles and that being the monster of a track that is Bitter Sweet Symphony but a lot of the other tracks sound very much like it and are still very good in all their own ways. I love all the orchestral elements in each of the songs and they are all elevated by the brilliant melodies and masterful production. I really cannot think of too many things that i can complain about when it comes to this album so i'll just say that it is an amazing listen and one that i'm glad i got for my 22nd birthday.
Best Song: Bitter Sweet Symphony
Worst Song: This Time

Tanto Tempo is an album that's just that one thing that you put in the background while doing something else, more so than many other albums. I have never known too much about this woman other than the fact that she did work on some of the Rio soundtrack and she is also the daughter of Joao Gilberto who has worked on some other albums on this list. As for the music itself, it is just background music to me. I will say that the addition of some downtempo elements on this album is certainly interesting but i don't think it elevates this album over the top. Bebel's singing is quite nice though and adds something to this album but nothing that makes me rate this album higher than 3 stars.
Best Song: Lonely
Worst Song: August Day Song

Man oh man, I've got a lot to say about New Forms and just how awful it is. Roni Size is often considered a pioneer in the drum and bass genre along with Goldie and LTJ Bukem and this album is also considered Reprazent's magnum opus which makes me dread what all their other stuff is gonna sound like if this is their best. This sounds like just a bunch of unfinished demos which were stretched out into 2 hours of 2 identical halves which made me think that only one of these halves should have been this album because i would have gotten more than enough of my fill from that. So, this album gets docked 2 stars for sounding like a bunch of unfinished demos, it gets docked another star for having an unnecessary second half and it gets docked another star for being 2 hours long.
Best Song: Morse Code
Worst Song: Change My Life

A Seat At The Table was a pretty decent R&B album. I never knew who Solange was or about her music but i am definitely well aware of her older sister's music (that older sister being Beyonce) and it is pretty evident that they are sisters since their music is certainly very similar to each other, each having that poppy R&B sound. Overall, i did like the songs on offer, they were nice to listen to and there wasn't one i would consider bad, however, I think that this album doesn't really have any stand out tracks. Every track here just kinda adds to the album's vibe rather than being good to listen to on their own. This album is decent but that's all it is.
Best Song: Cranes In The Sky
Worst Song: F.U.B.U.

Next was just a super fun album. I have never really known much about Alex Harvey or his band but i think this sounded more or less like i was expecting it to sound. Overall, every song was just an insanely fun ride that all sounded so swinging and upbeat. I can admit that The Faith Healer is probably one of the weirder songs on the album but for a weird track, its a really good one. The rest of the songs though had that exact vibe i love in this sort of glam rock. I did initially want to find a reason not to give it a 5 star due to the aforementioned weirdness of The Faith Healer but at the end of the day, this album is just far too fun for me to do so.
Best Song: Gang Bang
Worst Song: The Faith Healer

The Nightfly was certainly a solid album but a fair ways short of the other Steely Dan albums i have heard. This album definitely does feel like an extension of the Steely Dan stuff as this album has pretty much all the bells and whistles you would expect and they all sound quite good. But i still really can't deny what Walter Becker added and his absence definitely felt here as the songs here felt more samey than they did in any of the other Steely Dan albums i looked at. I still thought the jazzy vibe that the others had was still very much here and enjoyable to some extent but unfortunately, It pales in comparison to the other Steely Dan albums.
Best Song: The Nightfly
Worst Song: Walk Between Raindrops

G. Love And Special Sauce was an album that i didn't like very much. Their Wikipedia page said that their music was very sloppy and laid-back and that had me dreading what the album would sound like, and the next hour (just short of that actually) pretty much proved me right. The compositions feel off, the instrumentals are sloppy in a not very fun way and the vocals also suck for the most part. A lot of these aspects really made the album feel like it was dragging on and on. The saddest thing is, there are glimpses of something decent there but all the issues it suffers from can't save it from the fact that it is an album that made me want it to be over long before it was.
Best Song: Cold Beverage
Worst Song: I Love You

Elvis Is Back is a pretty okay album. It's no secret that i'm definitely very familiar with Elvis (who isn't at this point) This album however doesn't really seem to have any of the songs that i know from Elvis. The general sound of this album is decent and around the same level as a lot of the other rock and roll artists that i have looked at. I also feel that it suffers from basically the same issue as a lot of the others do. That issue being that every song sounds the same with barely any notable differences which just causes a lot of them to become very unmemorable. It is a perfectly okay listen but it does barely anything to stand out in a sea of albums like it.
Best Song: Such A Night
Worst Song: Reconsider Baby

Life Thru A Lens was far better than i was expecting it to be. I know Robbie Williams from a few songs, mainly stuff like Something Stupid (the one he did with Nicole Kidman) and Candy. I was expecting this album to be your typical pop album, with all the synthy sounds like Mariah Carey or something but this turned out to be far more rock oriented than i expected. The guitars are actually really strong here and the melodies are all really good too. Williams' vocals are very strong as well and the voice hidden song was especially beautiful. I don't really have too much to complain about so all i'll say is that it is a really good album.
Best Song: Ego Agogo
Worst Song: Killing Me

Channel Orange was quite a solid hip hop record. I have always heard of Frank Ocean's name with the praise his second album Blond gets and the anger people have with him for doing anything but releasing new music but i haven't been too familiar with any of his songs though. The music for the most part is pretty good bringing in a very Kendrick Lamar vibe with a couple of R&B elements too. There are a lot of intermission tracks with some having a bunch of sounds from the PS1 and one of the Street Fighter games (i don't know which one though). The vocals were also a bit hit or miss at points too. All that is to say this album is fine, just a bit unremarkable. Except for Pyramid though, whole extra star for that track alone.
Best Song: Pyramid
Worst Song: Super Rich Kids

Moby Grape was a perfectly fine psych rock album. I have never heard of this band prior to listening to this album but it is still more or less what i expected with it being a psych country rock band. The songs here were decent enough, pleasant without being overly annoying even with the 60s sounding guitars with the clear stand out being Omaha, i kinda enjoyed the blurry sounds it had going on. The album was also really short one at 30 minutes which was alright, The album did go on at a brisk pace without feeling like it was missing a lot but i still feel that there were some songs that i would have liked to be longer. Still a good album but not the greatest psych rock album.
Best Song: Omaha
Worst Song: Naked, If I Want To

Young Americans has that quality that i would come to expect from David Bowie. If i were to think of one difference between this album and his other albums. Then it would be that this album sounds a lot more jazzy than some of his others and has quite a few softer songs too. I'm definitely more of a fan of the former since when i think of Bowie, i think of some of his more high energy stuff, not really his slow ballads. I still thought the stuff that Bowie did do here was very good as it still had the orchestral goodness that i would expect from him. It is far from my favorite David Bowie album but overall, i still enjoyed it a lot.
Best Song: Fame
Worst Song: Young Americans

Unhalfbricking, Like Fairport Convention's other album, was a pretty decent listen. While the issue wasn't as bad as Liege and Lief, I still found myself losing track of what song i was on a little bit. I still was able to tell when the songs did actually end and move on to a different song. It still didn't change the fact that the songs did sound very samey though. I still thought the album as a whole sounded nice though. The folk rock vibe it had going on was relaxing and the vocals are very good too. I just still thought it kinda blended together for the whole album. It wasn't bad, it was just very forgettable.
Best Song: Who Knows Where The Time Goes?
Worst Song: Million Dollar Bash

Picture Book is a good, if dated album. I have never heard of this album or this band in my entire life so i had no expectations for this album. What i ended up getting was an album that had a style of music that was popular in the 70s but with 80s production and that's where my belief that this album sounds dated comes from. That isn't to say it was bad though, There were some really solid songs here and i don't think that there was a single one that i would consider to be bad but i just think that for an album from 1985, I would expect it to sound like an album from that year, not like a remix of an album from 1978.
Best Song: Holding Back The Years
Worst Song: Money's Too Tight (To Mention)

Giant Steps was certainly a weirder album than i was expecting it to be. I was expecting this to be a pretty typical 90s indie rock album with some hints of shoegaze which would justify that genre's tag in the styles section of this album but what i ended up getting was that with a whole bunch of extra weird things put on this album kinda akin to what the Super Furry Animals do. However, these guys don't do that stuff nearly as well as they did. I'm not saying it's bad but the weirder elements on this album can be very hit or miss either being interesting and unique or just being annoying. The point i'm trying to make is, When the album is good, it can be pretty good but when it is bad, it can be pretty bad.
Best Song: Upon 9th And Fairchild
Worst Song: Thinking of Ways

Green River is just a decent southern rock album just like their album that came right before this one. This one already draws a lot of comparisons to Bayou Country but that should be obvious since they were by the same band and even came out the same year. This album just has that sort of country southern rock sound when it comes to every aspect. It is also a very short one clocking in at 29 minutes which was nice since the music didn't really have enough happening to really justify being longer. I still think it is a very basic album and doesn't really do anything that other bands like them haven't done but as it still stands, It's a decent album.
Best Song: Sinister Tone
Worst Song: Tombstone Shadow
Side note: Time to rank the Creedence Clearwater Revival albums:
1. Cosmo's Factory
2. Green River
3. Bayou Country