Rated 8/10
“Partisan” & “Bird” are top-tier Cohen
Next favourites are “Nancy”, “Tonight”, and “The Old Revolution”
At L.C. album #4 I confess, I somehow get irritated hearing him say “your/her body”. Because there’s at least one example on all those albums- including some of my favourite songs, like “Suzanne” and “Manhattan”
March 29, 2023
Sublime experience somewhat ruined by having to listen to it on YouTube (FOUR ads in the first track alone).
I say sublime, because it somehow fit perfectly with taking a train through a frozen prairie, leaving the bustle of city life behind me if only for a day.
March 28, 2023
Rated 6/10
HL: "Happy When It Rains", "April Skies", "About You", title track
3 for the dreamy atmosphere, but pretty much every song follows the same formula, also heard in the one J&MC song I was familiar with prior, "Just Like Honey"- root chord, 4th, root, 4th...
March 27, 2023
Rated 8/10
HL: “Forest Fire”, “Charlotte Street”, “Patience”, “2CV”, title track
Odd case where I wasn’t thrilled about the album the first few tracks, but something clicked about halfway through & I revisited much of the album later the same day. Conclusion: all the literary references feel like he’s aiming, over most people’s heads, for the English Newspaper Critic TM-
BUT it also times well with my current musical interests, including nostalgic-leaning artists like Bleachers & Future Islands, and Leonard Cohen.
March 26, 2023
Rated 10/10
I lived for a year and a half in Ireland, and at least part of this album was playing on a bus going through County Wicklow during my last day in the country. Bittersweet!
Seems unfair to have to objectively rate an album I associate with curtains on a phase on my life.
But I thought this was just lovely, that 3 song stretch from Crazy Love to Mystic hits all the right notes
HL: Crazy Love, Caravan, Into the Mystic, Everyone
March 24, 2023
Rated 8/10
HL: "Who'll Stop the Rain", "Lookin Out My Back Door", "Run Through the Jungle", "Up Around The Bend", "Long As I Can See the Light"
Pretty great offering by CCR, though all my favourite tracks were on Chronicle, something I've heard a lot back in the day. The best surprise was probably the opening "Ramble Tamble", a hoedown that becomes a psych-rock jam, kinda like "No Time" by the Guess Who
March 24, 2023
Rated 4/10
Respect this from a production standpoint (thanks RZA)- the western/kung fu samples are out in full force, and songs are woven together to keep a consistent energy throughout- but it’s ~20 mins longer than 36 Chambers and not as engaging to me. There’s definitely highlights, but “mafioso rap”, as Wikipedia described it, has generally been the hardest rap subgenre to get into for me.
HL: “Criminology”, “Guillotine”, “Wu-Gambinos”
March 23, 2023
Rated 6/10
(Holy, you'd think at some point they'd fix the song titles)
HL: "Krautrock", "Jennifer" ""Run" (track 7)
March 22, 2023
Rated 4/10
Here’s a strange comparison: I recently gave Slint’s “Spiderland”, one of my 1st from the generator, a relisten (because I took a look at RateYourMusic’s favourite albums and that was way up there).
And my conclusion is I get overly frustrated with albums that have a great start but fail to grab my attention after that, & I think that’s what happened with “Street Life” (and the Slint album)
I feel that my disinterest in jazz growing up was because I thought it was all like this: slippery-smooth café background that takes the edge off waiting for that crispy panini
(Where was I…)
I kinda feel bad for ragging on easy-listening music for being easy to listen to, but I’m going with my gut with this rating
March 21, 2023
Rated 10/10
Volume 1 personal highlights: "All My Little Words", "Let's Pretend We're Bunny Rabbits", "The One You Really Love", "The Book of Love"
V2 HL: "Papa Was a Rodeo", "Kiss Me Like You Mean It", "The Sun Goes Down...", "Time Enough for Rocking...", "Promises of Eternity", "Abigail"
V3 HL: "I'm Sorry I Love You", "Bitter Tears", "Yeah! Oh Yeah!", "Blue You"
(Vol 2 out of 3 was my favourite)
The idea to listen to one volume a day came to me about 3 songs in, because I figured I'd get angry after listening to this for three hours straight. As I learned, my tolerance to 69 Love Songs was higher than I expected,
They cast their net wide, so much that hardly anyone's going to like every track here. Right? Plus, my love of the White Album has taught me that even the greatest works are allowed to have a little hot garbage mixed in.
Also, finding out Lemony Snicket laid down some accordion was a rush. Half expected to read Kenneth Oppel played the flute or something
March 20-23, 2023
Rated 8/10
I gotta get me one of those pagers, they sound cool
HL: "Check the Rhime", "Show Business", "Excursions", "Scenario"
March 20, 2023
Rated 6/10
HL: "Fun House/L.A. Blues", "Loose", "Dirt"
Alright, I won't try heroin! God!
Liked it somewhat more than the Stooges' debut. The wailin' sax doesn't let up in side 2, and the noise & improv builds up to a colossal finale. All this to say I get why others love this album.
March 17, 2023
Rated 8/10
HL: "Lovely Head", "Human", "Pilots"
Not even a day ago, I was reading about the pretty vocals in Snivilisation by Orbital to find out that they are in fact done by Alison Goldfrapp. And here she is again. Cool, experimental record. I wasn't too keen on the vocal distortion in "Deer Stop", but otherwise it joins the likes of Portishead's Dummy in chill-but-also-spooky records I enjoy
March 16 2023
Rated 6/10
I was vibing to the Brown Album a few months ago, but this Orbital offering is proving trickier to get into. It's colder, and more metallic-sounding, but also has some of the out-of-left-field samples I appreciated in the Brown Album ("Are We Here?", "I Wish I Had Duck Feet")
HL: "Science Friction", "Kein Trink Wasser", "Forever"
Rated 8/10
HL: "Ascension", "Til the Cops Come Knockin'", "Sumthin Sumthin", "Whenever Wherever Whatever"
-Unfamiliar with Maxwell prior to today
- Something (sumthin) about some prior neo-soul / quiet storm albums I've heard made me think I was pretty ambivalent towards those genres. However I quite liked this
-It was kind of a strange vibe mellowing out to this while walking through busy downtown streets.
- reading now that some critics describe the Suite as derivative of its influences; eh. While I'm not refuting that, it uses the freshest ingredients from EWF and Marvin Gaye d̶i̶s̶h̶e̶s̶ records
****
March 14, 2023
Rated 6/10
-I get nothing from the album cover but that they are a band with a drummer
-early impression is that this aged super well, they sound more like contemporaries of CHVRCHES and Alvvays than I'd expect from a '96 album
-spoke too soon, "Never Recover" & "Step on Me" are unabashedly mid-90s (not a complaint)
-then there's "Lovefool", which is both super 90s but also foreshadows the disco boom in newer pop (e.g. "Say So" by Doja Cat)
-someone, somewhere, a classic metal fan is surely upset by the Cardigans' inclusion of Black Sabbath- & another is fist punching the air
3.5
HL: "Heartbreaker", "Been It", "Lovefool"
also March 13, 2023
Hm, only knowing the sunny "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?" didn't prepare me for how forward-thinking & experimental Chicago's debut could be.
Has a great finale in "Liberation", with the superfast last couple minutes & the brazen, sirens/trombones (just around the 11 minute mark), but there's a few songs/jams in the middle I struggled to engage with tonight.
HL: "Does Anybody Know...", "Questions 67 & 68", "Listen"
March 13, 2023
Rated 6/10
HL: “My Back Pages”, “Mind Gardens”, “Renaissance Fair”
if bonus tracks count, then “Lady Friend”
Nice 1st Byrds album, easy-breezy folk rock, and then the backwards guitar in “Mind Gardens” jolted me out of that pleasant reverie 😬
Their version of “My Back Pages” is probably my favourite Byrds song.
Might be 4 another day, but let’s say 3 stars since there were a few songs this listen that went in one ear & out the other
March 11, 2023
Rated 6/10
HL: "Someone Somewhere", "Big Sleep", “Hunter and the Hunted”, “Promised You a Miracle”
3.5
It isn’t obvious to me that this is the same band that came out with “Forget About Me”. There’s more in common with the danceability of New Order, but a cooler shade that’s “The Hurting” era Tears for Fears.
Doing this 1001 has improved my 80s synthpop vocabulary for sure, for sure
Rated 10/10
How long has it been since I saw someone on Reddit recommending this album? 20 hours?
Turns out this is a real treat, the only song I knew before was "Race for the Prize", but it's great psych-pop rock all across the board- and 90s MIDI synths never sounded better
