Reviews by benc

I don't like Muse. The pseudo-dystopian "we are the rebels and our love will overpower the system" lyrics are very childish and I'm sorry not sorry to say it's hard for me to imagine adults who take this seriously. On top of that, the pop-prog sound is quite grating. That being said, I tried giving it a generous listen and to understand what people hear in this band -- they certainly "rock" hard, and I can appreciate that Muse (while wearing their influences heavily) don't necessarily have a cookie-cutter generic sound like so much other rock nonsense from the 00s. I will never choose to listen to this again, but I can at least giving a knowing "oh ok cool" the next time someone tells me they like Muse.

I really tried to bracket out my distaste for Billy Joel and give this a fair listen. His upbeat pop-r&b songs are undeniably well-written, but there's so much Long Island kitch here it really drags the record down. Feels like the kinda album you can only love if you drink at noon (or have a dad who did).

A perfect soul record, a perfect pop record. Astonishingly beautiful voice.

Great album. I'm still partial to psychedelic Byrds and folk-rock Byrds, but yeehaw Byrds hits hard.

I could've sworn I liked Blur at one point in my life. But listening to this was not enjoyable. An extremely uneven album packed with lots of goofy pop carnivalesque nonsense that tastes like bad old hard candy. The best songs on the album are "pretty good."

Right on! A real "classic" grunge sound that I love. Lotsa noisy guitars, gritty production style. No pop hooks here, which I honestly appreciate. Just a real nice document of a strong underground rock band in the post-hardcore years.

Tom Petty is the first last classic rock musician and there's a lot to say about this album, how Tom Petty signifies the "classic," how he embraces the "new wave," and how he was able to develop his own kind of authentic rocker image. But, above all that, he wrote some kick ass songs.

I adore this record. Like most Beefheart fans, I started with some of his most radical records and branched out from there. And don't get me wrong -- I love Trout Mask and Lick My Decals. But Safe As Milk might be my favorite of his. It's still extremely weird, but it choogles in a way his other records never really do (other than, maybe, the records that emerged from the Brown Paper sessions). I live for the blues and sometimes "blues rock" can be quite repellent, but Beefheart does it better than pretty much anyone.

The great Suicide!

A true inspiration.

The pinnacle of avant-garde rock n roll.

Apt title. A true musical crime.

Too many bands in the 70s were stricken with this wannabe-McCartney virus where everything had to sound like the Abbey Road medley. It's bad, aesthetically, and it comes off smarmy to me. It feels like some dudes started a rock band to prove how eclectic their tastes are and that they're actually refined composers who can pull from Tin Pan Alley, jazz, showtunes, classical, etc. Also, it's very funny that the first sentence of their bio on wikipedia is about how they were patronized by a Dutch millionaire -- this album sure sounds like it.

I don't like it and I don't even really respect it. Bad album.

I have weirdly mixed feelings about this album. It's the kind of record that sounds great on paper. Remain in Light is one of my favorite records ever, and much of this album sounds like the rhythm tracks from Remain in Light. So that's nice. But I'm also ambivalent about the "sampling" that happens on this album -- it's mostly exoticized flavor (appropriation) sprinkled on top of the rhythm section. Byrne/Eno are not actually that skilled at putting together a sonic tapestry with pre-recorded audio, and certainly were leagues behind their hip-hop contemporaries. The result is something a bit too self-consciously postmodern and a bit too "worldly cosmopolitan" in a repellent bourgeois manner (think of that awful Sting album around the turn of the millennium).

A phenomenally great album. It's hard to stand out in the crowd when you make music like this, and somehow Gillian Welch has done it.

Pretty cool. Exists at a liminal point in pop music history (1989-90) where it was unclear what was going to be the next big thing. They really took a chance with this album and made a strange blend of pop, dance, industrial, rock, and goth. Personal Jesus is among the strangest pop hits ever, so major kudos to Depeche Mode.

A perfect album and without a doubt one of the best rock records ever made. What a compelling band -- every member brings such a unique, creative approach to their instrument. I am not a metalhead but this, to me, is the best metal ever made because it isn't bogged down in the genre's conventions. If anything, they're making psychedelic blues rock and the "heaviness" is almost incidental. I adore Ozzy, and I feel such a strong affinity for his crazed hippie stoner madman persona (certainly much more so than the sex god rock icon persona of some contemporaries).

This is an enjoyable listen and the Everly Brothers can sing their asses off. But by the time Lucille came around, it confirmed my suspicion that this is extremely watered down rhythm and blues. Compared to their contemporaries, this album can sound pretty weak at times.

-Horrible. Some of the most generic, bloodless pop-rock ever made. Perhaps Eno's greatest flaw as an artist is his affinity for tepid soft rock.

-Most songs sound like Bono + studio musicians. And Bono is actually a legitimately awful singer and horrible lyricist. I invite you to look up the lyrics to 'New York' and swirl them around in your mouth a bit.

-This album is exactly when I remember really hearing / knowing who U2 were for the first time in my life -- I would have been about 13 at the time. I remember not understanding why U2 were played in the "rock" category because their music is just so damn fluffy and edgeless.

The first 2 VU albums are my favorite, but I've probably listened to this one the most. I got this record for 5 bucks at the Bop Shop when I was in high school and later I discovered it was one of the Lou Reed "closet mix" copies. This really is a perfect album. It's like a call back to Lou Reed's days as a novelty songwriter, but filtered through the Warhol experience. Also (for better or worse), this album basically birthed indie rock.

I liked this, but wanted to like it more. The collaborators were uneven and downright spoiled a couple songs. But there's also some good trip hop beats, especially at the beginning of the album.

PE's reception history has taken lots of twists and turns, and I think it's time for a reappraisal. Like the critics first noticed, this is completely groundbreaking music and we've heard little since that can produce the same kind of noisy, awe-inspired sublime.

Also, the only time I've ever fanned out in my life is when I met Chuck D. But that's a different story for another time.

I really liked this and it's much better than some of the other Massive Attack I've heard (which can get a bit too easy listening for me). Liked it enough to give a repeat listen. Especially love Tricky.