Reviews by avoidperil

It seems immediately obvious why this one is here, but it does throw up a few surprises. The first song is jaunty and fun. When Ken Lee starts playing, it feels out of place. I was completely disarmed by the Coconut song.

Oh - I know these guys. I listened to their other albums Lost Souls and Some Cities back in 2005. I thought they were good, while I searched the British music press for bands as good as Radiohead or Coldplay. These guys were held up along with the Magic Numbers and Badly Drawn Boy as the new, mature, pop-rock for a new millenium.

But listening to this now, as the middle album, I'm not sure. I might have listened to this before, but put it aside? It feels muddy and indistinct and not as iconic as the album directly before or after. It's not bad, just unremarkable.

This is fine. Pros: It's Pink Floyd lite. Nice playing. Interesting change-ups. Recognisable style and vocals. Cons: Very 70s art-rock. It hasn't really aged well like most 70s music. I didn't find myself bopping along, but neither was it terrible.

Immediate impression: Not sure if I like this? But then I started to hear it roaming out of punk, into garage alternative rock, into metal. I can hear Nirvana? Then a touching love song that questions gender. Then puerile adolescent rock. All laced with punk ethos that feels slapped together. It just finished and I need to go put it on again.

This will be my first 5 given to a formerly unknown album. I will absolutely be listening to this for years to come.

The easiest 5 stars I've given so far. This album shaped my early taste in music, so it's hard to hear it with anything other than biased ears. That said, it did spend a while in the wilderness until I found it again recently and truly realised that Nightswimming is one of the greatest songs ever written.

Listening this time, I realise I find the album has a very unusual sequencing. The back half is stacked with an amazing four song run.

Oh boy. The reputation of this album precedes it. I've seen it come up in a few lists and given a few attempts to listen but never found a reason to come back.

On this listen, the best track was easily YYZ. The second best was The Camera Eye, which despite its length had some really engaging moments. The thing that drags this album down into oblivion for me though is the lyrical and vocal performance. The lyrics are trite and cringeworthy, and the vocal delivery takes the interesting musicianship and sends it to the dumpster.

Which is a shame. With a few tweaks, this could have been one of the greatest and most celebrated bands. All the ingredients were there but they were squandered on a mediocre recipe.

This is in the category of "Oh I meant to listen to this but I forgot". I've heard various B-52s songs at parties over the years, but only remembered the hits. This is the first album where I've not known the album, but immediately wanted to play it again after it finished.

It's not a masterpiece that will end up in heavy rotation, but it's good.

Not sure how to feel about this one going in. Obviously a well known band and I knew a couple singles but never checked out the album. It could have gone either way.

This is... Not great. Even the singles are more languid and poorly realised than I remember or their later works. Disappointing, experimental, and messy.

Another one I'm very familiar with. And a frankly brilliant album, for what it is. It's cohesive and driven. Some of the songs are quite fun. It was part of revival in music, so has a huge part in rock history.

Do I enjoy it? Yeah. Is it a masterpiece that moves me? Not really. A great candidate for 4/5 stars.

I feel that I missed or dismissed this album very early on and never came back to it. Listening now, perhaps for the first time in full, I was hoping for something to stand out. But nothing does. Amy's voice isn't great in this one, but I can usually forgive a poor vocal performance. The production felt cloying, the instruments dead, and the songs derivative of a style I find uninteresting but that the production team also failed to transform.

This is not an easy listen. I know this album very well and it's a 'break glass in case of breakup' album. Some of the songs are clearly better than the others, but the songs that hit me have me in tears. An unreserved masterpiece. Another easy 5/5 from me.

Seeing those eyes after rating another mediocre album filled me with an adrenaline shot of joy. Teenage me grabbed her second (and better but not on this list) album, then devoured this one too. One of the few albums I can say I was too young to fully appreciate.

Only one track is anything less than perfect: The First Taste (and that's because it fell into some weird 90s R&B hole). Not ashamed to say I screamed along to Shadowboxer and Criminal in my car. And that closer - Carrion. MY FEEL FOR YOU BOY. So much soul in that delivery.

This album shaped me and my taste in music. Easiest 5 I've handed out so far.

Another live record? There's a lot of energy and vibe captured here, but also perhaps too much. There is a lot of screaming. A lot of unrefined energy. There's a 10 minute track of James riffing over a repetitive blues riff and hyping the crowd to scream for him - which is great if you're there but I'm not there. I'm not here for any of this.

Am I going to listen to this again? NO. Do I know why this is on the list? No. It could be left off. But I could listen to it. Solid 2/5 from me.

First impression: Who? This is not a genre of music I like. I've never even heard of this artist or album as a stand-out example of that genre. This has a massive uphill battle to even get me to say it should be on this list.

Based on my own criteria - Will I listen to this again? No. Does it deserve to be on this list? No. Is it possible to actually listen to? Yes. That's a 2/5 then.

My first album on the list that I'm intimately familiar with. It doesn't have the hits, but it hits different. It's probably the most consistent Smiths album with a solid set of songs bearing the weight through the middle.

Obviously a solid 5/5 with no reservations.

DNF. My first DNF and probably not my last. There's just nothing for me here.

Not a new one to me. I listened to this one 20 years ago when it first came out. I'm surprised how many tracks I forgot existed over the intervening time. But also not surprised. The first two tracks are exceptionally powerful and then the rest of it just tapers off.

Love that the Desperado track was copyright struck for being Eagles content so I can continue not hearing their music anywhere ever.

This feels like along album. It's fine I guess. I didn't find anything that gripped me musically or lyrically. Perhaps the best I can say is that for its time there's a lot of slick gloss here stuck to some quite middling ideas.

I understand why it's here on this list, but it's not something I'll be throwing on for my own listening pleasure.

Oh no. A live album. A band that I don't care for in the slightest. Well, here we go...
Wait a minute. The guitarist is breaking into a 3 minute guitar solo? The drummer is going off? Old, tired, familar songs being transformed into incredibly fun explorations by a band at the top of their game?

This is not my kind of music, but it's strangely compelling and I feel like I'll want to revisit it in future.

This doesn't register as music to me. I was playing it, loud, on my commute this morning. About 10 minutes into my drive I realised I was bopping along to a song and singing to myself.

It was a completely different song by a different artist from a different era.

This album is so bereft of anything that I consider music that my brain tried to fill the space where music should be. I value lyrics, melody, and texture. This music is so incredibly bland it's the kind of music you put on in the background when you don't want anyone to notice there's music playing.