Reviews by gmuzza

Generally pleasant enough folk music, although i didn’t enjoy the songs that strayed into electric like I want to see the bright lights.
A bit too trad folk for me overall

Maybe not as immediate as Nevermind but In Utero hits on another more visceral level.
Far more rough around the edges in general, but songs like Heart Shaped Box are as infectious as anything Nirvana did. I have always had a particular soft spot for Rape Me as it delivers the ultimate example of the quiet loud dynamic that Nirvana delivered so well.

Pennyroyal tea is a great song and certainly the best song ever to feature warm milk and laxatives. Radio friendly unit shifter shows kurt’s sense of humour as they deliver a wall of noise with barely audible vocals.
All apologies is a perfect closer, being more reflective than a lot of what came before.

This was not a Stevie album i knew before this. It hits all the classic notes.
Boogie on Reggae Woman is enjoyably funky.
You haven’t done nothing evokes Superstition with it’s funky accompaniment and is a highlight for that reason.
They wont go when i go slows things down and deliver an emotional vocal which probably rescues what would otherwise be a dull track

Sonic youth are a band I’ve always felt i should like more than i do. There is nothing here than changes that position. Everything is there to suggest i should love this album, but i dont. I dont hate it, it just doesn’t connect for me

I think a fair summary of this album is that it’s exactly what you’d expect from a Dolly Parton album. It’s fine but a bit too old school country and western for me and likes the punch of a 9-5 or Jolene to lift this beyond just being a reasonable listen.

Prior to this my only knowledge of Meat Puppets was through Nirvana covering them.
The vocals are shocking which makes the instrumentals a relief, even though they are hardly brilliant.
Plateau, oh no and lake of fire are obvious standouts (despite the vocals) but i suspect my opinion is distorted on these by the Nirvana covers.

Part of a whole takes a while to get going, but once it loosened up a bit i quite enjoyed it.

Minawa feels far too straight for my liking and is therefore quite dull

The jazz drum is the star of the big apple. Maseru offers a real freak out performance which finally offers some life, even of it ventures into “recorded in front of a live studio audience territory”. Inexplicably it goes into a dull piano break before the bass appears and speeds things along.
Inner crisis hits like a good old police drama theme.
Ingoo pow pow adds some vocals of sorts, but does nothing to raise the enjoyment levels.

Overall just a fairly dull album

When i aint the one kicked in i thought i might like this album, but by gimme three steps i was distinctly bored. It just plods along. I’m sure if i only listened to an individual track it might be alright but a full album ….no thank you.
It’s therefore an interesting choice to put free bird last in the running order. The clear highlight but so late it cant save a dull album

From the opening bars this feels like overproduced eighties guff. It may have been released at the end of that decade but there is no doubting what decade it came from.
Thing like love just sounded like Shania Twain (albeit this obviously came before her Mutt Lang era). So much i went scurrying to check that this wasn’t also produced by Mutt Lang, the fact it was however produced by Don Was is equally unsurprising.
Nobody’s girl and The Road’s my middle name are as close to a highlight ss you get.
If you like cliched eighties music you might like this, if not, avoid!

This album showcases Kanye’s (classic soul sounds)production as much as Common’s smooth delivery. The two work in perfect harmony.
More poetic than rap at times, Common manages to cover similar themes to mist hip-hop but delivers it in a subtle way.

I enjoy the urgency the music has, but some of the vocals are frankly annoying (see Male Model and I Gotta Getta).
Teenage dreams so hard to beat and that is true of Teenage Kicks , which is one of the best songs of all time.

Here comes the summer also provides a catchy more poppy detour.
Overall it cant help but feel a bit overshadowed by Teenage Kicks.

Smooth, nice. Latin?

Very relaxing and inoffensive but little more than background music

This is an album that defines heavy metal.
The sound of rain and bells lead perfectly into the ominous Iommi guitar sound setting a doom ridden tone that incapsulates Black Sabbath’s sound.

Ozzy was a great showman, but that doesn’t do him justice. Even on a slow song such as Black Sabbath he is so engaging.

Cards on the table, the Wizard is my favourite Sabbath track. I’m a sucker for a well placed harmonica (see also songs featuring banjos). The drums are insane on this and somehow it maintains the sense of doom whilst also being relatively upbeat and fun.

N.I.B provides more great riffage ‘oh yeah’. It provides a great a great rhythm to it as well snd man that ozzy vocal would fit happily on many of the late 60s/early 70s pop hits (if not the actual lyrics)

The fun instrumentation continues with the introduction to sleeping village, which appears to feature a mouth harp before those trademark riffs come in.

Warning takes showcasing the guitar virtuosity too far for my liking and into guitar wankery but i do kinda enjoy the more bluesy stroll that comes out the other end and the eventual return to the song (even if it does sound a bit like These boots are made for walking)

I really like the production on this album, but I’m surprisingly not that keen on the Beasties delivery.
This is firmly the era of Beasties I never quite got, and listening to this now, that hasn’t changed.

Just bog standard shoe gazery with annoying vocals (in the main). Feels very much like a band who managed to ride the coattails of others, rather than significant in their own right.
Much prefer Andy Bell’s post Ride output(solo, Hurricane #1, Beady Eye and Oasis)

It is the instrumentation that lifts this album as much as anything else. Solange’s vocals are good but i fear against a normal pop/rnb production they would be lost in the numbers of similar artists. However the production on this is great and elevates each song to make them interesting and complement Solange’s vocals perfectly.

Message in a Bottle is a great start to any album.
Regatta De Blanc showcases how great a rhythm section Sting and Stuart Copeland were.
It’s alright is far more punky than I’d associated with the Police and is quite reminiscent of Pump it up by Elvis Costello.
Unfortunately Bring on the night legt me feeling kind of bored and then i realised i was only half way through.
Deathwish offers something slightly different with the sharp guitar of Andy Summer staring, sounding very much like a toned down version of The aedge’s trademark guitar sound.
On any other day serves just to highlight how great a vocalist Sting is, with what is a decent song being held back by Copeland’s (?) more limited vocals.

Whilst there sre obvious issues with Does everyone stare i quite enjoyed the leap in style and central piano.
no time this tome rattles along at ferocious pace and again shows what a geeat drummer Stuart Copeland is, however like much of this album it just cant get close to the two stand out classic singles and left me feeling slightly flat as a result

Just sounds like fairly bog standard generic eighties rock. Lacks the fun of something like AC/DC or the electricity of prime GNR.

lil Devil at least injects a level of catchiness not provided elsewhere but still feels very paint by numbers.

Love Removal Machine manages to sound like a rip up of AC/DC and the Rolling Stones in one song.

Astbury’s vocals on Born to be Wild sound as if youve stumbled into a bar where the local drunk is belting it out on karaoke for the hundredth time

The start does not bode well for this album, sounding very much like a low budget version of their Sheffield rivals The Human League. It goes on for what feels like an age before we reach more casio keyboard sounds of Penthouse and Pavement. I fear it is becoming quickly apparent why I only know Temptation (unfortunately not on this album). The one slightly redeeming feature so far is the occasional bass break.

Play to win is an accurate amalgam of all the cheesy elements of early eighties music.overall this just made me appreciate Human League more

From the outset you can hear foreshadowing of the production that would work so well on Madonna’s mid/late- nineties albums. However i’m not a big fan of electronic music and this ambient nonsense does little to change me that with its whispery vocals and bleeps.
Overall I toggled between bored and irritated by this album. It is very much of its era with bits reminding me of acts like the propellerheads at times, but without the same impact they had.