Reviews by galway_rat

HL: "Constantinople", "Blue Rosebuds", "Lizard Lady", "Weight-Lifting Lulu"

can't give 1 star. clown'll eat me

June 11, 2024 (late)

June 11, 2024

HL: "Good Times", "My Feet Keep Dancing", "My Forbidden Lover", "Will You Cry (When You Hear This Song)"

I'm not sure if Chic needed 2 albums on this list, but what a funky, pretty listen. The slower songs like "Will You Cry" have a certain grandeur about them, and what's to say about "Good Times" that hasn't already been said.

BERNARD EDWARDS WAS THE GOAT.

also, officially at the 800th album!
What I accomplished in the last 100 days:
-became un-unemployed
-turned another year older
-survived the (admittedly mild) winter

June 9, 2024

HL: "Life Is Better” (featuring Norah Jones), "Shaka", "We Fight/We Love" (featuring Raphael Saadiq), "Official", "Move"

Smooth

I wouldn't say it's a giant step forward from ATCQ, but Q-Tip's jazz-rap styling updated for the sounds of 2000s hip-hop isn't as dated as I figured it would be. The inclusion of old-school-sounding soul works for me, and the guests (Jones, D'Angelo) are pretty well pitch-perfect for the album's stylings.

Today my heightened interest in the Soulquarians (sparked by listening to Common & D'Angelo last week), meant I paired this album with J Dilla's kaleidoscopic album Donuts (J Dilla produced "Move” on this album according to Wiki). And that was a good move- both that and The Renaissance further prove that there is a lot more to modern hiphop than I assumed at the start of this journey.

The fact this is all after his Sun Records stuff (“Mystery Train”, “That’s All Right”) means I have a bit more digging to do in the early Elvis catalogue before I get the complete picture.
Despite the raucous album cover, a lot is subdued crooning, but I don’t mind it. The simple, echoey production is timeless in a way Elvis is Back! wasn’t for me

HL: “Blue Suede Shoes”, “Blue Moon”, “I’m Counting On You”, “I Love You Because”

June 8, 2024

HL: "Dumb Waiters", “It Goes On”, “Pretty in Pink”, "All of This and Nothing"

Some decent new wave today; I'm not crazy about Richard Butler's vocal performance in this, however. He doesn't sound that different than in "Love My Way", the only PF song I was familiar with. Maybe it's the lusher production in the latter that distracts me. But his too-cool-for-school snarl in songs like "I Wanna Sleep With You" is just annoying.
That song contains two of the things that redeem this album as a whole, funnily enough: the overdriven guitar and distorted saxophone parts (see also: "Dumb Waiters").

June 7, 2024

June 10, 2024

HL: “Feel”, “El Goodo”, “Thirteen”, “The India Song”, “Try Again”

A much sunnier counterpart to their Third album, a lot closer in sound to their British Invasion influences and further from the 80’s/90’s alt rockers that would follow in their footsteps.

HL: "Politik", "In My Place", "The Scientist", "Clocks", "Daylight", "Green Eyes", title track

Definitely not 1st listen
Parachutes is fine, but I like THIS

I am a product of my environment (growing up in the 2000s), which in other words means I would put Viva la Vida or X&Y on a 1001 Albums of my choosing*, to say nothing of the Muse inclusions. But even without the orchestras of Viva or the arena-minded synths of X&Y, AROBTTH is prime sadboi jams.
"Politik" is like a first stab at writing "Fix You", but almost as good, where "Green Eyes" is one of their best ballads.
If you're not convinced by this album, put on "The Scientist" whenever something inconvenient happens: a breakup, a parking ticket, forgetting your toast in the toaster & then it's cold & dry.

June 5, 2024

*Maybe even Ghost Stories, if I'm feeling frisky

HL: "Fu-Gee-La", "Killing Me Softly", "Ready or Not", "No Woman, No Cry", "Zealots"

June 6, 2024

German industrial? On my birthday ;)
Can a guy be so lucky

The lead singer was also in the Bad Seeds for two decades, which makes this inclusion a lot less surprising. The book entry also draws direct comparisons to Throbbing Gristle & Faust, fellow "sonic terrorists" that I've already come across thanks to this list. This is definitely the least musical of the bunch, and therefore is not popular on this website, to say the least.
The consensus seems to be that Kollaps is a bunch of freaks banging on pots and pans, but that's not ENTIRELY accurate in my eyes. The ritualistic proceedings of many of the tracks carry a sense of dread, as though they're the opening ceremonies to something awful and unspeakable. The low-quality recordings and abrupt ends to the tracks further add to the wrongness of this album, like it was never meant to be released. The cherry on top is the album cover on Apple Music; it's slightly crumpled, like a hasty photocopy of a used record sleeve.

I definitely hört with schmerzen, but I didn’t hate it.

2.5

HL: "Tanz Debil", "Steh Auf Berlin", title track

June 1, 2024

HL: "Janie's Got a Gun", "Love in an Elevator", "What it Takes"

Self-proclaimed Aerosmith fan here—
The singles hold up for me but some of the deeper cuts weren’t as satisfying. Sounds more homogenous (in a big 80's radio rock kind of way) than Rocks & Toys in the Attic. Also, the interludes like "Water Song" & the didgeridoo are cool but ultimately don't add anything to the songs they follow or precede.

On the other hand it does have “Janie’s Got a Gun”

3.5/5

May 31, 2024 (later on)

HL: "You Learn", "All I Really Want", "You Oughta Know", "Hand in My Pocket", "Ironic"

It's been at least 100 albums since I've had one I've heard before.

Is it bad that "You Oughta Know" has my favourite Flea bass, even among RHCP songs?

Is it a perfect album? No, but also yes

May 31, 2024

HL: "Time Travelin' (A Tribute to Fela)", "The Light", "Funky for You", "The 6th Sense", "Geto Heaven Part Two"

I found the perfect album to bridge this album with 1999 (yesterday's album): Voodoo* by D'Angelo. On one hand, D'Angelo has a lot of similarities with Prince, both in romantic R&B jams and in being a multi-instrumentalist prodigy; on the other, he worked with a group called the Soulquarians to usher soul/R&B into the 21st century. The Soulquarians included members like Erykah Badu, the Roots, and Common.

I don't know a whole lot about Badu or the Roots (time enough), but album #197 on this journey was Common's Be (2005), an album which evoked The College Dropout a lot more than Voodoo. I'm curious to see where this album's sound lands on that spectrum.

Okay, it officially supplants Be as my favourite Common album! Probably too long, but the big guest list and messing about with genre helps keep LWFC from becoming stale. J Dilla's production is smooth as heck, but the song that jumped out at me the most was handled by DJ Premier of Gang Starr, "The 6th Sense". Like the aforementioned Badu & the Roots, I know I'll be coming across Gang Starr at some point on this website, which I look forward to.

*Voodoo was much more enjoyable to me than Brown Sugar (1995), the one solo D'Angelo featured on 1001 Albums.

May 30, 2024

HL: title track, "Little Red Corvette", "Delirious", "Automatic", "Something In The Water (Does Not Compute)", "All The Critics Love U In New York"

A small step down from Purple Rain, but comparing any Prince album to Purple Rain is unfair. Comparing any *album* to Purple Rain is unfair.

Though some songs move outside the formula, this is a high NRG collection of songs for dancing, and songs for... 👀 👀 👀
fucking.
And who wrote those kinds of songs better in the 80's than Prince?

1999 sounds a bit more claustrophobic than his other two albums on this list, due to him recording pretty much every instrument himself. But the illusion of a full soundstage is helped along by the production (He did that too? makes sense). "Little Red Corvette" sounds like it was born in a stadium.

May 29, 2024

HL: “Si Tu Dois Partir”, “Who Knows Where the Time Goes?”, “Percy’s Song”

An album of ‘almosts’. The patient crescendo of “A Sailor’s Life” almost quickened my pulse. “Million Dollar Bash” almost made me want to dance.

Maybe I just happened to be craving higher energy music today, which sometimes happens as a result of the randomness: mood & time of day are both vital factors in how I perceive new music.

Still pleasant enough, accordion laced tunes, and a good first impression of Fairport Convention.

3.5

May 28, 2024

HL: "Something 4 the Weekend", "If You Don't Want Me To Destroy You", "Hometown Unicorn", "Bad Behaviour", "Death By Melody" (bonus), "(Nid) Hon Yw'r Gân Sy'n Mynd I Achub Yr Iaith" (bonus)

It's been about a year since the last SFA, but in the meantime I found an album involving Gruff Rhys, called Praxis Makes Perfect. They (the project Neon Neon) toured with it as an immersive theatrical experience, about the life and times of Giangiacomo Feltrinelli. You know, that Italian socialist activist and fighter of censorship, active during the 50's and 60s?
(I didn't know him either)

My point is, the seeming ease in which SFA comes out with eccentric, unconventional stuff makes them a pretty intriguing act to learn about. And while Fuzzy Logic is a little easier to follow than Rings Around the World, the flair for experimentation & genre switching is there. I'm listening to the "B Sides & Such", including tracks sung entirely in Welsh, and it is good.

Now, having listened to all the b-sides, I'd even say there's a better 12-track album hidden somewhere between the normal tracklist and the bonus ones. As released, Fuzzy Logic is still pretty damn neat.

May 26, 2024

HL: “Tom Sawyer”, “YYZ”, “Limelight”, “The Camera Eye”

Roll out the red/white carpet, we got some more CanCon today 🇨🇦
While I’d hate to rate it highly just because of an allegiance to some cloth 🇨🇦, it’s both my favourite and most consistent Rush album I’ve heard (so far), so I think it deserves its flowers. Unlike some other proggers on this list, I prefer this band’s 80s AOR era.

May 27, 2024

Well, of all the Fall albums I’ve heard this is definitely a Fall album.

While it would be easy to admit defeat after 3 albums, I intend to put on Hex Enduction Hour sometime soon, considered one of their best outside of this list.
There’s always the possibility that the combo of Smith’s vocals and the noisy guitars just isn’t for me, despite the bristly, energetic performances heard in this debut album.

We're at the 8th album (afaik) featuring ol' Neil. I'm pretty sure they've all gotten 4s and 5s from me, so it may be a safe bet that I like this too. I don't recognize any song titles, but I didn't with On the Beach (4 stars n counting) and Ragged Glory (4 stars) either.

I think this might be a grower. It’s pretty bleak & pessimistic, but also features great performances (eg. the guitar in “Steppin Out”. However, I wouldn’t say musically there’s much else done better than the later Crazy Horse albums (eg. Rust Never Sleeps)

Pretty sure all that’s left of this guy on this generator is Harvest (1972), his biggest hit…

HL: “Steppin’ Out”, “Borrowed Tune”, “Albuquerque”

trippy lima beanss

Put off this album for a while in anticipation of it appearing on this website, though I did recently get into Strawberry Jam (2007) by them, as odd and as noisy as it was.

The cover is very fitting for the music: bright, psychedelic, if a little nauseating over time. I don't normally use that word for albums I like, ever, but today is an exception. "Brother Sport", the closing track, is a good example of where that tension comes from- beautiful Wilsonesque harmonies filtered through unpredictable, high frequency boops. It provides a distance between me, the listener, & the melody/bones of the song similarly to how the heavy distortion works in MBV's Loveless.

Though ultimately, it IS smoother on the ears than Strawberry Jam, which helped "My Girls" blow up like it did. I'm not saying that makes it better, but it it does mean it comforts more than it ruffles me.

It may be some hipster shit, but in the words of Gwen Stefani, "This my shit".

HL: "My Girls", "Summertime Clothes", "Daily Routine", "Taste"

May 23, 2024

It’s probably one of my least favourite on this whole list. for all my ambivalence towards fellow post-hardcore outfit Slint, at least they had menace & theatre going for them. This just plods…
In theory, twin bass guitars should provide a unique twist but it gets really muddy and monotonous. Speaking of monotonous, I was worn out on the singer’s rasp after two songs.

HL: “Bullet Proof Cupid”, “7 Seas”

May 22, 2024