Reviews by forestfly2009

Very early krautrock blended with psych and prog. It is wild, it is out there, it is completely fucked. It was created by a German art commune who were high as fuck in the woods.

The album cover features the band's late sound man, Wolfgang Krischke. Dude went on a bad trip and died of hypothermia while tripping on LSD. To immortalize his memory, they displayed him as the grim reaper on the album cover. An interesting sentiment, but amusingly, to me, he looks like a cross dressing Beatle moreso than the grim reaper, so I feel they did him dirty a bit.

I love how horribly unhinged this album is. A LOT of drugs went into the creation of this one. This is the kind of random shit that should be featured on this list more.

They were ripping on drugs, but they were onto something. This feels like a crossing over point from all the psychadelic 60's music to a more prog oriented rock. Its like some mutant form of Hawkwind, who just happened to do more drugs somehow. I would think that bands like The Mars Volta and Tool took lots of inspiration from these guys. Seems like they took this sound and polished it more to make it more palatable to the greater populace. This album here is just unforgiving and raw.

If and when you listen to this Amon Duul II album, make sure you listen to Disc 2 as well. From what I can see, only Disc 1 is included on both Spotify and Apple Music. Had to go to YouTube to get the second disc for some reason. That particular disc is phenomenal. It consists of 3 songs that were completely improvised on the spot during one of their jam sessions. Fucking nuts what they could come up with on a whim. Especially the song Sandoz in the Rain.

If you didn't catch it, the title Sandoz in the Rain is a nod to the lab in which LSD was first synthesized and commercialized (Sandoz).

Favorite songs: The Return of Ruebezahl, Cerberus, Sandoz in the Rain, Archangels Thunderbird, Halluzination Guillotine, Rattlesnakeplumcake

Least favorite songs: Gulp a Sonata, Flesh-Coloured Anti-Aircraft Alarm

4/5

Favorite songs: Careful, Brick By Boring Brick, Ignorance, Looking Up, Where the Lines Overlap

Least favorite songs: Playing God

3/5

Favorite songs: Drone: Nodrone, Warsong, And Nothing is Forever, A Fragile Thing, I Can Never Say Goodbye

Least favorite songs: Endsong

5/5

Favorite songs: Guest List, My Brain Hurts, Don't Turn Out the Lights, The Science of the Myth, Teenage Freakshow, Kamala's Too Nice, What We Hate

Least favorite songs: none

5/5

The only National I liked was The National news on CBC with Peter Mansbridge. This was really boring. Took me two days to get through.

Favorite songs: Brainy

Least favorite songs: Racing Like a Pro

2/5

Favorite songs: Spy Kiss, Bubblehouse, Night Marchers, Think, Dracula, Strance of the Spirit Red Gator

Least favorite songs: Henduck

4/5

Hipster folk. Not bad.

One thing about the album cover.....that bear is CAKED UP!! Look at them cheeks!!!!

Favorite songs: Change, Red Moon, No Reason, Blue Lightning, Spud Infinity, Certainty

Least favorite songs: Sparrow, Wake Me Up to Drive

3/5

Favorite songs: What About Me?, Jambone, Sleeper

Least favorite songs: Kite

3/5

This is the second Songs: Ohia album I've had on the post - list (the first being The Lioness). This is the better of the two. Both were good, but this one in particular was fantastic! Sound was better, more polished.

The only song I didn't like on the album wasn't because of anything Jason Molina did. It was Scout Niblett's voice in Peoria Lunch Box Blues. It was God awful. The rest of the album was stellar!

Favorite songs: Farewell Transmission, The Old Black Hen, I've Been Riding With the Ghost, Just Be Simple, Hold on Magnolia

Least favorite songs: Peoria Lunch Box Blues

5/5

The sound on this live album is terrible. Washed out distortion. No idea what the singer is saying except for the odd "WHOOOOO!!!" High energy. Not bad garage rock. I wish it was a studio album though so I could hear them properly.

Favorite songs: The Dream, Tidal Wave

Least favorite songs: Sticky Hulks, Contraption

3/5

What in the actual fuck is this?? Some moron took news clippings from the morning of 9/11 and laid them over soft jazz that you would hear on elevators or as call center hold music. This "artist" didn't even make the songs...he just took existing shitty jazz and made it shittier. This isn't music so I don't understand why it's on this list.

Favorite songs: The Weather Channel 9...I guess...

Least favorite songs: this whole album

1/5

This is that new wave of rock music that's been popular now for the last 10 years or so. Foundations in rock, but they mix in some electronic/dubstep sounding stuff by times, and screaming to make the music seem more hard. Very similar to like Bad Wolves, I Prevail, or Ice Nine Kills. Not terrible....it's the kinda music that's trying too much to be hard. I'd think that adolescents, or people just starting into rock and metal would like this kinda stuff because it's more palatable. Radio stations and media would like it too because it also has foundations in pop rock.

All that to say, I get why it exists, but not my favorite. It sounds good and it's catchy, but looking at it from a traditional rock/metal standpoint, it's just kinda soft. And this whole album has snippets of like a sci fi/space travel movie playing in the background....which is annoying......it's like fucking skits on rap records .....why is it there?

Favorite songs: My Demons, Halo, Down With the Fallen, Carnivore, Let It Die

Least favorite songs: Telescope

3/5

Favorite songs: Holocene, Perth, Beth/Rest, Michicant, Calgary

Least favorite songs: "Hinnom, TX"

4/5

Favorite songs: I Am the Wooden Doors, You Were But a Ghost in My Arms, The Lodge

Least favorite songs: In the Shadow of Our Pale Companion

3/5

Judging by the album cover, I thought maybe a light pop record or something, but it's a hardcore punk band!!

Holy fuck this album hits hard. It's based on the singer losing his mum to cancer. It hits like a fucking sledgehammer to the heart. In a way only punk can. When I want to listen to emotional music, I gravitate towards this kinda stuff because it can convey pain and agony in a way no other genre can.

Fuck this is an emotionally charged album. Dude was going through it....what he put to paper was beautiful and heart wrenching. Insanely heavy, insanely emotional, insanely dark, but in a weird way, there's hope and light. It's this guy's way of being able to come to terms with and move through this hardship. It's important that this music exists. So many people go through this kinda shit and can't deal alone. Music, to me, has always been a healer. Without music I'd be lost. Hearing this shit let's people realize that they aren't alone in their grief. Gives them somewhere to turn to help deal with the pain instead of burying it.

Everyone should really listen to this album sometime when they have the time to sit and absorb it, and are in a mental state to be able to do so. Unfortunately, I'm sure a lot of people can probably draw similarities from this kinda scenario. Fuck cancer.

Favorite songs: Displacement, Flowers and You, Rapture, New Halloween, Eight Seconds, Posing Holy, Skyscraper, Gather

Least favorite songs: if forced to pick, Water Damage

5/5

Favorite songs: Pneuma, Fear Inoculum, Invincible, 7empest, Descending

Least favorite songs: Mockingbeat

4/5

Favorite songs: Way Down Hadestown, "Hey, Little Songbird", Why We Build the Wall, Our Lady of the Underground, When the Chips are Down

Least favorite songs: "Epic, Pt. 1"

4/5

Died of boredom before anything happened....

Favorite songs: Sitra (simply because it's a shorter song....)

Least favorite songs: this whole shitty album

1/5

My knee jerk reaction upon seeing the album cover this morning was: "oh great, some more shitty pop music". What I heard was drastically different. Blackgaze......black metal mixed with shoegaze and screamo. Holy hell was I wrong!

It's weird. It's just a wall of distorted sound, with a "singer" who just makes gutteral screaming noises about 4 doors down from the recording studio. Not a bakers fuck of an idea what he's saying.

It's a really weird concept. The wall of noise is surprisingly warm, albeit deafening, but you pair that with the bloodcurdling screaming from a few doors down and it's like this weird light/dark balancing act. It displays, to me, like someone's inner struggles. Hope overlaying the constant quarrel with depression and anxiety?

All in all, not something I'd necessarily revisit, but not the worst thing I've ever listened to. You would have to be in a certain mood in order to be receptive to this kind of music. It is pretty dark and hard to digest by times. Certainly an assult on the senses.

Favorite songs: Dream House, Sunbather

Least favorite songs: Please Remember, Windows

3/5

One of my favourite bands discovered through this 1001 albums exercise. I loved the album included on the original list (Lost in the Dream), and I love this one too. Thanks to the OP for including it! These guys remind me so much of Tom Petty/Bob Dylan/Don Henley/Adam Baldwin. Right in the vein of music I really enjoy. This album is a gem!

Favorite songs: Pain, Nothing to Find, Strangest Thing, Up All Night, Clean Living, You Don't Have to Go

Least favorite songs: none

5/5