Reviews by bee-york

A fun inclusion today but something that feels more suited to being a dance track than something for your everyday playlists. That nature also made the album feel pretty repetitive over its kinda long runtime

Some real car commercial-core tracks on here that really started to meander into one another while just being 'pretty good' I was enjoying it for the most part for half an hour but was feeling pretty numb to it as it reached its close at nearly an hour.

I don't know why this was the album chosen for this band

I couldn't tell a lot of the time if this album wanted me to relax or keep me on edge, the vocal segments are really nice and tend to be complemented by more pleasant background tunes, though some of the instrumental stretches feel like they are trying to induce some sort of panic or unease in how odd they are. A down the middle score for something which aptly left me feeling the same way

Not a bad performance, a lot of it just blended together and I can't tell how much of that is because of the Live performance structure and how much of that is just The Who's sound. I'm really not a fan of these live albums that don't really capture the atmosphere of the event. Maybe they might have some appreciation from hard-core fans of a performer or people who are into music history but most live albums that follow this trend just feel like poorly recorded iterations of their studio verions

'Legendary Crash Outs' has been a bit of a trend on twitter the last few days so seeing this and reading about the circumstances behind his performance really did improve my appreciation for it. As pleasant as it was however, it does sort of dip a bit into jam session territory for me where after listening to more or less the same instrument for an hour it started slipping into the background for me a bit.

The Dans of Steel return with another practically perfect album. A much more laid back and jazzy affair than Can't Buy a Thrill, but one that I found myself enjoying just as much.
I legitimately can't understand how someone could hate this album or not at least appreciate the talent on display, either as active or background listening this shit is as easy to listen to as drinking water
I'm not one who usually is too attentive or appreciative of drums in music but some of the tracks in this (especially early on) really catch your ear. A set of great songs at the start which leads into a section of practically perfect songs from Deacon Blues onwards

As a whole yeah, it's not as good as Low. But god damn I love the titular song, I think it may be my most listened to song on Spotify. I don't think the rest of the album is bad but Heroes is definitely doing a lot of heavy lifting here

15 - Rings Around the World (Super Furry Animals) ****
I like the idea of the authors tearfully crossing off different potential Bob Dylan/Neil Young deep cut albums so they can make space for more britpop on this list.
This album gave me the same vibes as overly eccentric IPA brands you see at liquor stores called like ‘Kaiju Luchador’ or some other pricey bullshit. Much like those I’d have to say I enjoyed this a lot more than I would have originally cared to admit. It certainly has a lot more of an identity/sound to it than most other britpop on this list.

14 - Queen II (Queen) ***
Pop Culture and Hollywood has fucking ruined my perception of this band, hard to really appreciate but I can’t knock it as being dull or irritating either, just an enjoyable enough cut of some of their less well known music.

I used to know a guy who was really big into The Byrds/Flying Burrito Brothers who ended up being a performative/tradlarper dickhead so I was kinda hoping this would be ass so I would feel validated in some form. Unfortunately for me what I got was a really fun listen which was likely the best psychadelic/folk music from the 60's that I'm gonna hear on this list. The final few tracks did feel a bit weak compared to the first two thirds but were still solid enough to where I didn't even realize I had burned through the whole album and was listening to the extras at some point.

13 - Elephant (The White Stripes) ****
It feels really mean to say since I liked this album a lot but it felt as though the two of them are REALLY good at the basics/fundamental stuff but just don’t deviate too far into stuff that would produce much ‘wow factor’. Ironically, the bluesy parts of this album which were arguably the safest stuff on the album were also my favourite. While I felt that the ‘controlled chaos’ garage vibe of the 2nd track Black Math was very full on at first, I do wish it was maybe a bit more prevalent in the remainder of the album.
God I really feel like a jerk for complaining this much about an album that I enjoyed from head to toe with tracks coming in at a ‘good’ at the bare minimum with plenty of diversity in its sound. It’s just a bit harder to highlight the standout elements here aside from the tremendous technical talent on display. To many another cinematic comparison as I have in the past, this reminds me of a lot of Christopher Nolan films of the late 2000’s - 2010’s where his movies are all created with such technical competence that it just feels wrong to not applaud it.

12 - The Wall (Pink Floyd) *****
It would feel quite wrong if after reviewing 3 albums of this band that I was left with little to say given the quality is fairly prima facie and self-evident. Given this album seems a bit more controversial and with how much primarily Waters is putting of himself on this album, I feel this would be an appropriate place to give a few more thoughts on one of their albums other than just saying it is really good.

With how introspective the plot and thematic relevance this rock opera gets, it’s impossible to shed or avoid labels of sap or pretentiousness. But even if these were elements that did irritate someone, I don’t see how you couldn’t look past it when it is handled and presented with this level of artistry. The stylings of a hazy reminiscence of ones life throughout the whole album feel tangible and structurally sound. While I wouldn’t say there are any songs on here that are bad or even mediocre, it’s clear to see they knew what the standouts tracks are, and the surrounding tracks stretch from one to another to form its act structure (I wouldn’t dare to consider it a 3 act structure as there are more than 3 standout songs on here). I would say disc 2 is stronger overall (the stretch of songs from Comfortably Numb to Waiting for the Worms is literally perfect). Waters can get a bit of flack for his vocal components on here, but I can’t see anyone but him performing these parts, from the subject matter being deeply personal to the way he gradually adjusts his performance, feeling in a way like a time lapse showing Pink at their different stages gives a really raw sentimentality which I am sure has endeared this album to so many people, myself included.

Putting any kind of artsy fartsy critique lens aside for a final moment, this is probably the coolest I have heard a guitar sound in a single album? Michael Mann (a creator whose films are all very introspective to their main characters) chose to have a rip-off of Comfortably Numb in two of his movies and they both fucking slap

Even when britpop has a bit more glam and trippiness to it which is usually up my alley it still finds a way to sour on me with how mundane the end product usually becomes.
I was actually enjoying a few of the tracks towards the beginning, particularly Heroine, but then after that daddy's speeding song everything started poetically going a bit downhill in terms of my enjoyment. I get it dude you have a lovely David Bowie impression now please turn the reverb down a little even I have my limit for that stuff

An Album I honestly would never have expected to be considering my thoughts on as much as I did, but took me a while to decide how I felt about. For something labeled as indie rock it is not exactly what I had in mind on my first listen but I had high hopes, my first listen had me a bit uncertain at first but with a pretty positive final impression with the last few tracks. subsequent listens really had me growing in appreciation for this one with a better understand of what to expect. Definitely not perfect and one that I would imagine leaves a pretty strong positive or negative reaction. I would say the middle chunk is the weakest seciton of the album

Some Strange Cargo indeed, not sure what I was expecting from the cover or the wikipedia summary but it was still a incredibly laid back and enjoyable hour of music. It may be a bit too passive or for the lack of a better term 'video gamey' for some (there were some tracks where I was expecting to start hearing the UNATCO theme or some shit) but this was definitely something I see myself coming back to in the future

Man, the more of these Stones deep cuts I hear the more I really see these guys as greatest hits merchants. A lot of this is just very dull and derivative faux blues/honky tonk bullshit, I don't know why their albums are littered with this and then sprinkled with a few of their breakout tracks. the opening and closing tracks are definite highlights for me and save this from a negative rating in spite of the fact that hearing Jack Nicholson may have tainted my listening experience of Gimme Shelter. As for the rest of this album though, if I paid to see this live and ended up getting fatally stabbed by some Hells Angels meathead, dying would probably only be the 2nd worst thing that happened to me that night

I was hoping this would be the Bob Dylan album that finally clicks with me. Sadly, I would say it misses that mark. I am always left feeling the same 'distant admiration' for Dylan that I get with a majority of the Elvis Costello albums on here, I can recognize that they are a talented artist and can see why some people might laud them to the degree they are held to but just can't see myself putting any of this music into my rotation.

Any initial novelty that comes with the edgy nu-metal vibe started to dissipate within the first few songs. Perhaps any chance at me enjoying this kind of music was whipped out of me by the Triple M propaganda wing but I just found most of this annoying. In the end gets a pass though

Maybe chalk it up to a difference in the listening experience but this one just did not gel for me as much as its predecessor (which was one of the first albums I got on this list). It has a similar issue where the instrumentals prepared for each track feel like an afterthought to Cohen's writing (I know at least The Partisan is a cover, not sure about the rest). While his vocal performance still gives the impression that he only wants to put about as much effort into it to be considered singing rather than a poetry reading, I think it still matches the tone that it is going for. Which in the case of this album is a bit bleaker than I remember from Songs of Leonard Cohen, perhaps that too bummed me out on my first impressions.

Starting to feel like these Costello albums are akin to different bottles of flavored water.