Reviews by gmuzza

This is an enjoyable listen with two out and out classics. I have always preferred ‘How to mend a broken heart’ to ‘Let’s stay together’ but there’s not a lot in it.
Outside of these two tracks I really enjoyed ‘It aint no fun to me’.
It’s strange then that i dont see this as anything above a 3.5/5.

Less than a minute i to Chameleon and it was already annoying me and there was still 14 minutes left. It didn’t get any better for me either. Just a repetitive jam. Yes it changes periodically but it changes and then just loops the new bit round and round, change and repeat.

Watermelon Man was familiar sounding, i suspect more than being sampled than the original.

Sly felt a but too busy and vein melter just dull

This is the album that properly got me into Jay-z’s music. I love his laid back style of delivery and nothing complements this more than Kanye’s production.

Takeover manages to deliver a listenable dis track, which shouldn’t be taken for granted. The big hitters though are clearly Izzo, Girls, Girls, Girls and Never Change. The production and selection of these tracks is solid gold and highlights what a great producer Kanye was before he was engulfed by his ego (although Bully shows the talent is still in there if you can separate the person from the music)
Heart of the City, Never Change and Song Cry are as strong as you get in the middle of an album. They are an uplifting trio of songs.
Renegade delivers a different type of song with it matched more to Eminem faster style of delivery than the rest of the album. It provides an interesting counterpoint to the classic samples used elsewhere and works as an outlier but the strengths of this album are firmly with the more upbeat productions

Today was the first Smashing Pumpkins song i remember hearing and remains one of my favourites.
It manages to be both very guitar heavy and melodic at the same time.

Disarm brings a more orchestral feel that foreshadows the epic Mellon Collie and Infinite Sadness.
I like how Soma continues the quiet reflection only for Geek USA to grab you and shake you awake once more.

We are in the middle of a late May heatwave and this is a great album for a hot sunny morning.

It is so chilled, sea breeze would perhaps be as appropriate as Sea Change.
The crescendo at the end of Lonesome Tears is almost Beatlesesque. This is Beck in full on acoustic singer songwriter mode.
Generally its a really solid album with the occasional dip, yes Round the Bend, I am talking about you.

Overall this is a 3.5/5 but i dont think it’s quite as strong as a 4 so 3/5

This is just a beautiful melodic album. Norah Jones’s voice is so rich and soft and the tracks bring this and her piano playing firmly to the fore.
Come Away With Me and Dont Know Why are obvious standouts but the rest holds its own.
Painter Song feels like a Parisian bistro on a warm summer’s day. The Long Day is Over sounds like the end of a night in a good jazz club.

This was a real coming of age for the Charlatans, delivering a strong cohesive album.
North Country Boy is an outstandingly catchy song (and another nod to messers Mark and the boy Lard).
Tellin Stories manages to capture the floaty Tim Burgess vocals of previous albums and marry it with a more straight laced Britpop backing.
One to Another takes it further, building on songs like Weirdo snd delivering a monster of a son that summons up the spirit of Madchester to deliver a massive tune that demands you to move.
The following tracks maintain the high quality before How High blows the bloody doors off.
Only Teethin is an underrated track could hide in the shadow of How High, but like much of this album has such a strong groove to it, it cant be denied.
Get On It again delivers that combination of rock and soul that works so well for the Charlatans, providing a chance for the opportunity for the respective parts of the band to shine, before coming together again giving the track a real live feeling to it.
The keys are what gives a lot of Charlatans tracks their trademark feel, so it’s astonishing to remember that they lost Rob Collins part way through and closing what must have been such an emotional with Rob’s theme seems very fitting.
When i saw this was today’s album, I was confident this was a 4/5, but having listened to it it all the way through for the first time in a while i actually feel this is 4.5-5/5 album

This album promised so much with a fusion of multiple styles, but just falls flat.
It’s at its best when the South African influence is at the fore. Unfortunately McLaren vocals (if you can call them that) spoil tracks like Double Dutch.
Duck For The Oyster is a fun closer though .

Just a bit too overblown for my liking. Aside from Jump it just feels like very dated AOR.

Ramones are a strange prospect for me, in that i feel ai should like them more than I do. Songs like Blitzkrieg Bop are great but a lot of the rest just passes me by. Not unenjoyable, just not anything than stands out.

This album excels when the track has a guest vocalist. Nick Cave vocal style really doesn’t appeal to me save where it is contrasting with PJ Harvey or Kylie, even if these tracks just make me think of the Shirehorse’s versions (long live Mark and Lard).

Other than these ‘The Curse of Millhaven’ at least offers some life, but does kind of feel like they’ve just sped ‘Henry Lee’ up. ‘The Kindness of Strangers’ isn’t too bad.

I enjoyed more than i remembered. Obviously Poison, Voodoo People and No Good are the standout tracks, but all the tracks up to No Good are fairly strong. Unfortunately i think the quality drops thereafter.

We had Prince’s Sign O’ the Times a couple of days ago and were large parts of that seemed self-indulgent and excessive, Stevie makes this just effortlessly cool.

It is the perfect sunny spring morning album. ‘Sir Duke’ is obviously a standout, but that shouldn’t overshadow the other tracks. ‘Love’s in Need of Love Today is a brilliant opener and this level is sustained until we reach the aforementioned SD, when the roof is blown off. ‘I Wish’ nearly manages to maintain this impossible level.

It’s hard for someone my age to hear Pastime Paradise without thinking of Coolio’s Gangsta’s Paradise, but his job was made so much easier by having an already classic track to build on. ‘ordinary Pain’ is a beautifully crafted song about heartbreak and perfectly closes the first part of the album.

‘Isn’t She Lovely’ shows you have to take something that should be sickly sweet and turn into a perfect pop song.
‘As’ is a beautiful pop song that delivers a soulful chorus that cant help but make you feel good.

I went into this album thinking that i didn’t like The Fall, and I was right.

Tuneless accompaniment to a man who cant sing. “Make music for itself” Mark E sings, if only he’d taken that advice.

The track ‘Sign O’ The Times’ is such a great track and is difficult to better as an album opener. However, my underlying issue with most Prince albums are the tracks that go too far across the line and are just loose jams. Enjoyable yes, but i dont need an album stacked with them.

Toward the end of ‘Play in the Sunshine’ the drums make me expect Bono to start singing’Sunday Bloody Sunday’

After this we enter the aforementioned jam tracks. It all feels like he needed someone to rein in the genius a bit and provide some more focus to it all.

Just to much focus on his exceptional guitar work to be anything other than ok. ‘Oye Como Va’ is the standout track and highlights how this works best when embracing their latin routes.

Whiny and depressing seems a fair summary. I would single out ‘Treat me like a human being’ as a specific low, but it’s probably unfair given the rest is similarly dire.

I did however enjoy ‘Suedehead’, but one song does not an album make

I really enjoyed the production to this album which feels like the limk between gangsta rap and artists lile Tribe and the Beasties with a latino element.

Despite the lack of ‘Insane in the Membre’, the one CH track i actually remember this is s really strong offering

Just no.

Tjis album bridged dance and alternative/indie mainly thanks the big singles. These still sound as vibrate today as when Firestarter was terrorising the charts.

The rest however was better in my memory than hearing now. It’s not bad just nothing great.