Reviews by galway_rat

July 3, 2024

HL: title track, “Mood Indigo”, “What Is This Thing Called Love”, “I See Your Face Before Me”, “I’ll Be Around”

I don’t generally get a kick out of Sinatra’s music. I found the last album hokey (maybe the 2-star rating was too harsh), but THIS tho?
Turns out when you replace cheeky 50’s come-ons with rueful meditations on love and loss, I like Frank Sinatra’s voice a lot more.
I also friggen love the orchestra ebbing and flowing behind him, but that was also true of Songs For Swingin’ Lovers. Both arrangements are courtesy of Nelson Riddle, whose name I’ll have to look for in other contemporary recordings to this one.
Also, I find the whole is greater than the sum of its melancholy parts, as good as the individual songs are.

July 8th, 2024

HL: title track, "Over the Hill", "May You Never", "I'd Rather Be the Devil"

Pleasant folky album, didn't stir me as much as his other one on this list (album #768), but I'd like to revisit this in the future (maybe when the leaves start changing)

The upright bass player- Danny Thompson according to the liner notes- really stood out for me tonight for some reason. He also plays on One World, as well as Rod Stewart's Every Picture Tells a Story and the Incredible String Band's The 5000 Spirits, two other folky albums I enjoy.

July 4, 2024

HL: "Hospital", "Roadrunner", "Someone I Care About", "Dignified & Old" (bonus)

I like the organ, thanks Jerry

Context is important; if this was recorded when it was released (1976), it feels like awkward trend-chasing. Knowing that it was actually recorded as early as 1971 makes it surprisingly Modern!
Despite its similarities to 90s alternative & its likeability, if we're talking about marble-mouthed proto-punk music, it has stiff competition in this list. Like, if I had a choice between The Modern Lovers, vs Lou Reed, or Iggy Pop, or New York Dolls, or Television...

(the night of) July 2, 2024

HL: "Safe from Harm", "Unfinished Sympathy", "Daydreaming", "Hymn of the Big Wheel"

First Massive Attack album /🔥\
I must admit I don't know much about this band besides "Unfinished Sympathy", which I've listened to quite a bit. Does anything match the majesty of that song? No, but what's left of Blue Lines is good in its own right.
Though it's disjointed in a way debut albums can be, with wildly different creatives & collaborators offering wildly different ideas, there's enough to unify these songs- ghostly synths, vinyl crackling, fantastic drum tracks.
~Will probably like this more over time. I feel like I've heard a lot of music recently that is in some way inspired by Massive Attack; definitely bumped some Burial this past winter

HL: “Mad Cyril”, “Brain Dead”, “Lazy-Itis”, "Hallelujah (Club remix)" (BONUS)

I'll just paste this from the last Mondays:

'File this under my “big dumb fun” albums' (November 2023)

Because as much as I want to love the psychedelic haze and bass-heavy grooves, it just goes in one ear & out the other. In fact, Bummed does that more efficiently than Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches.

Even though I tend to get down with the new wave & Britpop picks, Happy Mondays, though caught somewhat in the middle of those genres, doesn't intrigue me all that much. But it doesn't bother me either

June 28, 2024

HL: “Comin’ Home Baby”, “Lonely Avenue”, “One Who Really Loves You”, the title track to end all title trax, “I Got a Woman”

I like how they had “Mo Onions” ready to drop as a single 2 years after “Green Onions”

This is really the pop answer to Jimmy Smith’s jazzy Back at the Chicken Shack, though I knew of Booker T long before Smith. That probably accounts for the higher rating, even though the album is a somewhat disjointed grab bag of covers. My Dad always playing instrumental oldies in my youth clearly rubbed off on me.

Though, as far as ‘60s instrumental albums go, this has about as much right to be on the list as any of em.

HL: "Tinseltown in the Rain", "From Rags to Riches", "Stay,", "Heatwave"

like Avalon but better

June 26, 2024

HL: “You Shook Me”; “Greensleeves”, “Beck’s Bolero”, “I Ain’t Superstitious”, “Ol’ Man River”

That’s a lot of Rod Stewart this month, but I’m not complaining (I just got Gasoline Alley, & relistened to Every Picture Tells a Story)
Interesting that he’s just another instrument this time in the Jeff Beck Group, rather than The Frontman; he’s also great in this, as is Beck, Nicky Hopkins & Ronnie Wood of Rolling Stones fame, and JPJ of Led Zeppelin fame. Man I took for granted how intertwined these British rock acts are

June 24, 2024

HL: "Sweetest Decline", *Pass in Time*, title track, "Stars All Seem To Weep", "Blood Red River"

Two things are true: I haven't really listened to Beth Orton before
& I have this on CD because I recognized it from the book

Dr. John keeps popping up in this list in unexpected ways (this, Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space), and I'm all for it.
Also, Ben Harper on guitar?? (saw him live a while back with Charlie Musselwhite; not sure which songs have him in them [edit: "Stolen Car", "Love Like Laughter"])

Guest stars out of the way, I really like Orton's style; it's rootsy, but proceeds in a freewheeling, dreamy way. The songs themselves have a timeless quality about them, even though the downtempo/folktronica elements date the album to the 90s.

Damon Albarn album count (not just this website): 6, or
3 Blur (Modern Life is Rubbish, The Great Escape, self-titled)
2 Gorillaz (self-titled & Demon Days)
The Good the Bad & the Queen (self-titled)

...And yet at times I still feel I haven't *gotten* it yet. Perhaps Parklife will spark my understanding of the Albarnsphere.

There are definitely some sparks happening

The racing hound cover is surprisingly accurate to the rate in which this album fires out creative ideas. The Kinks/Bowie comparisons are almost too easy to make, but like what 69 Love Songs does (more aggressively), it also checks in with styles of dance, punk and new-wave that preceded it a few short years prior.
Okay, Damon’s voice is same-as-it-ever-was, but... scratch that. "To the End" is the best thing I've heard that guy do vocally.
Ridiculously fun album, and I don't even consider myself a Blur fan (*cues up The Ballad of Darren right afterward to possibly contradict myself*)

HL: "Girls and Boys", "Tracy Jacks", "End of a Century", "The Debt Collector", "To the End", "Clover Over Dover", "Jubilee", "This Is a Low"

June 23, 2024

June 22, 2024

HL: title track, "Sea Song", "Catch the Sun", "The Man Who Told Everything", "The Cedar Room"

Doves #3, if we're counting their involvement in Badly Drawn Boy's The Hour of Bewilderbeast.

After their other album on this list, I wasn't super interested in delving further into their catalogue. Maybe due to these storm grey clouds threatening rain all day, I found Doves easier to listen to. The first couple songs weren't all that intriguing, but with "Sea Song" onward the album kept growing on me.
"The Cedar Room" might be my favourite song on here, but it seemed like a bold choice to release it as their 1st single on their 1st album, with the slow build & droning bass. Though considering Coldplay filled stadiums with "Yellow" & "Fix You" a couple short years later, maybe not

Not 1st listen

If not the top of all the new wave/pop/punk albums of the late 70's/early 80's, then pretty darn close

HL: “Hanging on the Telephone”, “One Way or Another”, “Heart of Glass”, "Picture This", “11:59”, “Will Anything Happen”, pretty much every other song tbh

June 21, 2024

June 20, 2024

HL: title track, "Lonely Street", "The Twenty-Fourth Hour", "Are You Sure", "Let Me Talk to You"

On the day I got k.d. lang's Shadowland, I lamented I wasn't getting much sad, croony country from the actual "golden age" here, instead getting modern acts very much inspired by those sad crooners.
Tonight I'm eating crow, since Ray Price, an artist I've never listened to before (increasingly rare on this website*), scratches that itch for me. It's got:
- great singing
- great lap steel
- Floyd Cramer piano (that's almost always mixed too quietly tbh)
- Willie Nelson
- melancholy mood music that fits the title (although much of Night Life's middle could also pass as AM radio in the A.M.)
- plenty of reverb

*Only other artists this month that I can say I've never put on before are The Coral, since curiosity about the most-hated albums on this list led me to both the Residents and Einstürzende Neubauten earlier

HL: "Peace Dog", "Love Removal Machine", “Electric Ocean”

HL: "Roadhouse Blues", "Waiting for the Sun", "Peace Frog/Blue Sunday", “Land Ho!”

A stellar 1st half, with some of their best psychedelic tunes & blues numbers. 2nd half is good; listening to both this and L.A. Woman reminds me that I prefer their earlier stuff ("hello i love u") to later-day Morrison. Still rounds up to a 4

Title track slaps

Not as consistent as Every Picture Tells a Story, but amiable enough (that album was one of my very first on this website, but I just relistened to be sure)
Also this beats the Faces album by a bit, just because I can vibe with this mellow folk easier.

3.5

HL: “Creature Comforts”, “Only a Hobo”, title track

Things I know about The Coral:
1) Bri’ish
2) they’re named after coral

Things I learned today:
1) During a weekend of 1st time listens for both the Smiths' self-titled debut & Meat is Murder, The Coral might be my favourite jangly rock out of the three of them!
2) Music critics really like white reggae, especially in the vein of Madness/The Specials. However, the tracks here are fun & few enough in number ("Skeleton Key", the hidden track "Time Travel") so the comparison luckily does not define the album as a whole.
3) Well it's something I kinda knew already, but I really like a lot of "neo-psychedelic" bands that carry 60's pop sounds into the 21st century. The Coral is no exception

HL: "Shadows Fall", "Dreaming of You", "Simon Diamond", "Skeleton Key", "Calendars and Clocks"

June 16, 2024

September 2022, Queen Liz dies and I hear The Queen Is Dead for the 1st time. That was album #160

Nothing would be heard from those boys in the coming months, until this website gave me a solo Morrissey album, Your Arsenal, to listen to (#421). Album #591, #605, and #761 were also Morrissey, as it turns out.

I guess my interest in The Smiths wasn't high enough to dive deep into their work in the meantime, but I always knew there was more to come on the website, so... yay?

For the most part, this is a solid album. The lightness of the jangly guitar and rockabilly rhythms strike a good balance with Morrissey's heavy-handed lyrics. The only time I found the balance was off was in the title track, which is a decent sound effects-driven dirge but feels more like a PSA than anything.

HL: "The Headmaster Ritual", "Rusholme Ruffians", "Barbarism Begins at Home", "Nowhere Fast",
"How Soon is Now" (bonus track)

June 15, 2024

June 14, 2024

HL: title track, “Hungry Like the Wolf”, "Hold Back the Rain", “Save a Prayer”, "The Chauffeur"

All 3 Duran Duran songs I knew before today are on this album
(nvm I know “Girls on Film”)

Like sophisti-pop, emphasis on the pop

It sure keeps its energy throughout the album, the closing track is unexpectedly beautiful, and the title track is timeless

4/5

June 13, 2024

HL: "Bucky Done Gun", "Galang", "10 Dollar", "U.R.A.Q.T.", "Amazon"

3.5

Maybe I don't love it as much as Kala, but its 42 minutes breezed by. Standout is "Bucky Done Gun" pretty early on in the record, with a brilliant sample of "Gonna Fly Now" from Rocky