Reviews by guggmo

It’s a pretty good 3.5 that I’ll bump up to 4.

This doesn’t really get up to a 5 for me, but with another knockout hit or two on here, in that almost timeless “would hear on a medicine commercial made for the boomers” sort of way, I think it would’ve gotten close. Regardless of that, I enjoyed this a lot – it’s very steeped in its time of people trying to catch the success of The Beatles in their own way, but this album tends to feel more original than that. The only times it misses are the moments where tracks feel a little too Beatle-y, namely “If You Knew”, which just felt aggressively OK.

I just thought this was rather nice – a lot of the tracks clicked with my sensibilities, and I thought the instrumentation throughout the album was really strong. There’s a bit of bossa nova in here, some jazz, and even stuff that sounds kinda like Stevie Wonder, which adds up, considering the “A Place in the Sun” cover (by the way, a big thank you to The Young Rascals for introducing me to a new Stevie song). It’s not a great album, but it’s a very enjoyable listen, with some fun melodies, some good vocal structures, and some good vibes throughout. It’s very much a 60s album, but it’s the sort of 60s album that I enjoy. I’m fine with going up to a 4, and I’m glad it’s on the list.

I’m at a 4.5, and I wish I could leave it there, but I’m gonna be that guy who goes up to a 5.

This album feels like a very distinct bridge between the 80s and the 90s – I’ve mentioned before that Run-DMC made commercially viable hip-hop possible, N.W.A. gave rap the blueprint to have the amount of edge you’d find in albums to come, and A Tribe Called Quest provided the perfect melding of both. This album feels like the bridge between N.W.A. and A Tribe Called Quest – not necessarily in terms of subject matter (though some of it overlaps), but mainly in its production. A lot of these tracks feel blended between the late 80s style (heavily sampling just the drums, more stunted and less melodic flows, long verses without a break) and the early 90s style of production (effective use of pauses, more melodic flows, more diverse sample use).

It’s a really interesting listen for that alone, but what drives this album for me is how effective it is at managing to blend the two in a way that still feels classic and fresh – stuff like Mama Said Knock You Out and Around The Way Girl are the two foremost examples for me, though I’ll throw a quick shout to “6 Minutes of Pleasure” as well.

I don’t think there’s a bad track here, just a few that aren’t as melodic and more driven by wordplay, and to each their own when it comes to that sort of thing, but I tend to enjoy both. I think LL Cool J’s flow is great on most of these tracks, and when it’s not as good, the lyrics do carry it (save for that godawful "I sure wouldn't rape you" line). The beats are relatively diverse, but a few of them sort of fall into that “mainly sampling just the drums” thing.

I just really enjoyed it – I really wish I could keep it a 4.5, because in spite of how much I enjoyed this, I don’t think it’s quite at a 5, but it definitely feels like it should be higher than a 4. I don’t mind going up to a 5, but I can see this falling on any subsequent listens; for now, though, I liked it enough to give it a 5. Someone will probably give this a 3 to balance me out.

I’m at a very very easy 10. (No pun intended.)

I’ll try my hardest to not make any direct comparisons to Nevermind, but let’s be clear; these albums are effectively the Pokemon Red & Blue of Seattle grunge, down to the damn colors of the album covers. You cannot go wrong either way, and comparing the two serves almost no purpose. They’re distinctly different, and it really just comes down to which one you prefer, and I enjoyed them basically equally (with just a slightly biased edge toward Nevermind, based on familiarity).

The only thing I really knew from Pearl Jam was Even Flow – I think most people have probably heard Even Flow, whether it’s from all the videos mocking the indiscernible lyrics, or as just a straight up banger of a track. It’s an all-timer, but I think I’m glad that it was out of the way early on this album, because it gave so much room for so many of these other spectacular tracks to breathe and have their own space.

I truly do not think there is a single bad track here – between the rocking instrumentation, Eddie Vedder’s slightly coarse but controlled vocals, and the excellent writing that evokes some level of imagery and emotion on almost every track, this album swings for the fences and ends up hitting the damn Moon. It is a knockout shot of a debut album, with maybe one or two “lesser” tracks that are still great to listen to. It’s definitely more loaded towards the front and the middle, but I think Release is an incredible closing track.

I really don’t have the words to wax poetic about this – other people will have other platitudes to say that will better capture my mood after listening, but I just thought this was great. Very deserving of all the acclaim it gets, very deserving of being on the list, and I’m just glad I finally had an excuse to listen to it. That’s a really captivating 53 minutes, and so very deserving of a 5. Definitely a 10/10.

Well, that’s an easy 5.

I really only know Thin Lizzy for “The Boys Are Back In Town,” and while a lot of this album’s setlist features tracks that carry a lot of that song’s DNA, I do think this album manages to make those tracks stand out and feel rad on their own – this is my first time hearing any of these tracks, whether studio or live, and the energy behind them just felt off the charts. Lots of great variance here too – a few love ballads, a few “great war stories,” and just a lot of bangers from top to bottom.

It does start to kind of wear you down over time – there is a point where a lot of these do start to blend together, feel a little samey, and the blustering guitar and drum solos don’t quite hit as hard as they do earlier on the album. However, make no mistake about it – I think this was a fast and exciting 78 minutes. There’s not a second of empty air here, and even if a track feels “flat,” it’s still an awesome listen. I don’t have any real complaints here, only nitpicks for my musical tastes. I really fucking enjoyed this – very glad to dive deeper into Thin Lizzy, very glad to get some new bangers, and a very easy 5 to give.

I’m at a 4.5 and I’m gonna yet again bump it up to a 5.

Truthfully, I was really leaning towards a flat 4 for most of the album, and then something about the last 4 tracks just clicked incredibly well for me and I felt like I just had to bump it up.

I obviously know who Lana Del Rey is, but I’ve never heard a single one of her albums in full – she’s been the pop star of the 2010s that I just never really connected to for one reason or another. I know some of her bigger singles, but I’m guessing that I was too focused on pop melodies and choruses to really appreciate her stuff to that degree when I was younger. I feel like I need to go back now, because I really did enjoy this a lot.

There’s a lot of Jack Antonoff’s production quirks that permeate this album, and they’re incredibly noticeable on the tracks that sound distinctly like any of Taylor Swift’s more recent stuff. He has a style, and it does work, but I’ll be damned if it’s not starting to feel sterilized & homogenized across all the singers he works with. However, as the album moves on, settles in, and truly gets its identity across as a “this is how the industry can really fuck with your mental health” album, those production quirks sort of melt away, and I got really encapsulated by her writing and her vocals. God, her vocals are beautiful. Her writing is stellar too – lots of great one-liners throughout here, and really strong imagery.

The only reason I was at a 4 for so long is because something felt sort of missing throughout the first 7 tracks of the album – just a little more edge in the vocals or the instrumentation that wasn’t quite there. The last 4 tracks won me over – they just feel like a fully cohesive fit, just one long package that finally kicks in some of that edge and strength that was a real joy to listen to, and properly won me fully over on the entire album. The last track in particular (the Joni Mitchell cover) just solidified it – it’s so thematically fitting to the album, and it just shows me she’s got a real mind for making albums, and not playlists. A lot of these tracks aren’t things you’d typically release as a single, and while a lot of them are “for the girlies,” there’s enough to admire here that I think anyone can pick it up and listen.

So, yeah, I really enjoyed it. I gotta give it another listen to try and catch what I might’ve missed on the earliest tracks, but it’s a really, really nice album. It’s no less than a 4, I think. Maybe a 3 if you hate Jack Antonoff’s style, or modern production in general. I’m fine with bumping it up to a 5. As far as it being on the list, I do feel like it popped up a bit too soon – this is a 3-year-old album, but it popped up in the 2021 edition of the book, so I feel like it got its flowers very very quickly and probably bumped something equally as deserving (or maybe it bumped Haute de gamme, good riddance). However, I am glad it’s here if only because I’m selfishly happy I got to listen to it.

I’m at a 4.5 that I’ll bump up to a 5.

It’s just a really, really nice sounding album. I think the lyricism here has a lot of depth, and I do need to dive into them a bit more, but on a first pass, from everything I was able to catch, there’s sort of a melancholy hidden behind all of these brighter tones. Most of this album is more upbeat than anything on Pink Moon, and while it surprised me, it didn’t shock me in terms of the quality of the tracks.

There’s not a single bad one here; I’d honestly say this album goes 10 for 10. The only reason I’m not at a flat 5 is because of my own shortcomings with the lyrics, but I know that’s a stupid reason, hence the bump. A lot of this album is driven by piano, guitar, and percussion, but it’s composed and produced in such a way that the lyrics and vocals get a chance to shine.

In a way, some of the tracks blend together, especially the instrumental ones, but it never takes away from the overall theming of the album – to me, I think this album is mainly about trying to push on through the sad times. There’s a lot of self doubt riddled throughout the lyrics that I was able to catch, but there’s always a hint of hope at the end of most verses and choruses.

I just enjoyed it a lot – I think it’s no less than a 4, and I’d be remiss not to give it a 5.

That’s an incredibly easy 5.

I’ve never heard this album until today – the extent of my knowledge of Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails is the few times Weird Al has touched on them in polka stuff, and that Trent Reznor did the soundtrack for Quake 2. Yeah, I know, not a great basis to work with.

This album is a fucking masterclass in using sound design to convey not only a mood, or an atmosphere, but personality traits and full-fledged storytelling, and I can’t say I’ve ever really heard an album break convention to use sound so effectively as a device in this way. I love the way harsher tones denote a more broken mind, and how calming stuff represents the last bastion of sanity left in this main character we’re following. I can only assume this is partially Trent Reznor himself, whether it’s a bit exaggerated or not.

I’m really just stunned; that was a very fast 65 minutes, and it’s remarkably just how much it touches on while sticking to its harsher tones – there’s elements of electronica and dance in here, anchored by some very 80s-adjacent soundscapes, but really torn apart and deconstructed, like the last grasps of a mind trying to find comfort in the past and having them distorted and ripped away. Trent Reznor’s vocal range, as far as his emotional depth goes, is rather impressive here.

I could keep going, but I’m just utterly blown away. Somehow, through all of its pain, it’s kind of beautiful in its honesty. This isn’t a playlist album, not by a long shot, but for 1994, this feels deeply fresh and somehow timeless, even if it’s the least traditional sound there could ever be. It’s a really, REALLY good album, and a highly recommended listen. An incredibly easy 5.

I’m at a 3.3 that I'll bump up to a 4 (I can explain later), but I gotta tell you, I really do admire the scope and scale of this project. I think I would recommend going through an actual listen to this, but not all at once; 23 at a time, just to spread it out and give the brain some sanity.

I really can’t believe I actually listened to all 69. It felt a lot easier doing it 23 at a time with spread out breaks, but it’s still so many fucking songs. I categorized each song into 3 distinctions: liking it, being indifferent towards it, and outright hating it. I liked 30 of the songs here, for various reasons, so that’s pretty good. I was indifferent towards 36 of them, and while I can’t speak to how good or how bad each of the ones I was indifferent towards really was, I’d say most of the “good” indifferent ones were on the second disc, and a lot of the “bad” indifferent ones were on the third disc. I only really hated 3 of the tracks, and part of it is either from subject matter, bad instrumentation, or terrible mixing.

I don’t wanna speak to the entire album as a whole, but I did ultimately enjoy this. It’s a slog, yes, but it’s a rather worthwhile slog. There are some good songs in here, and the scale of the project makes it kind of impressive that I really only hated about 3 of the tracks. Either that, or I have a really high tolerance for mediocrity.

If I had to rate each “disc” (set of 23) as their own individual albums, I’d say disc 1 gets a flat 3 – it wasn’t egregiously offensive, but it didn’t do anything too special either. Disc 2 gets a 4 from me – easily the best set of the whole bunch. Lots of great production, and probably the best lyricism of the album. Disc 3 was the weakest one – it’s a 2.5 that I’d bump up to a 3 because it’s just got the most bland songs on the album, and the good ones are probably the most average between the 3 discs.

That’s how I ended up at a 4; those rankings together average out to about 3.3, but I'll be nice and bump it up to a 4. I admire the hell out of them for making an album that hits pretty well, but if 36 of your tracks get met with a shrug, then you kinda just made 30 good love songs, 36 straight-to-DVD soundtrack songs, and 3 outright bad ones.

However, this is still worth a listen, because I’m sure someone else will like more than 30 songs here. It’s an album with so much variance, and it covers such a strong variety of styles and tones, both in its instrumentals, vocals, and lyricism that it’s impossible for any 2 people to have the exact same tracklist as their “liked” ones (although Epitaph for my Heart & Papa Was A Radio should universally be on that list). It’s a very solid 4, and I can totally see how other people can give it a 5. People giving this a 1 or a 2 either listened to it all at once and got burnt out, or barely listened to it. I’m totally fine with it, and I did honestly like the album.

Never give us a 69-track album ever again, please.

I’m at a highly recommended 4.5 that I'll bump up to a 5, again.

Much like the Pretenders album felt kind of like the first real album of the 1980s in terms of setting the tone from a production, instrumental, and lyrical standpoint, I think this album might’ve really set the tone as the first real album of the 1970s. Yes, you could call me a complete moron and point to Abbey Road as such, far ahead of schedule, and I would call that valid. However, I really think this touches deeper into the sort of folksy Americana that defined the direction the U.S. took as a way to reclaim its own sound from Beatlemania, and in that way, it feels like the first album of the 70s from an entirely American perspective.

I fucking loved this. The only reason it’s not at a flat 5 to begin with is because I do think some tracks don’t tonally mix super well as a cohesive album from front to back (very specifically targeting “Everyone” here, but Come Running kinda suffers from this as well), and sometimes his vocals are too incomprehensible because he’s throwing too much emotion into them… but those are realistically nitpicks in the long run. They might bite at me more on subsequent listens, but I shouldn’t care that much. I think just about every track here is a fantastic showcase of this jazz/swing/rock hybrid that gets nailed to perfection in terms of the soundscapes – there’s some really stunning stuff, and the 2013 remasters do them incredible justice in terms of balancing and mixing.

Before listening to this, the only Van Morrison song I was aware of was Brown Eyed Girl, and I’m so very glad this isn’t just 39 more minutes of songs that sound suspiciously like that. This is a really, REALLY good album, and it’s very deserving to be on the list. I’m surprised that I’ve never interacted with any of these songs before now, but they’re deeply down my alley. Just a great album, and a very easy one to bump up to a 5.

It’s a highly recommended 4.5 that I'll bump up to a 5.

I’ve always had a slightly softer spot for ska, for whatever reason. I think something about the instrumentation just clicks really well with me, even if the songs are usually kinda hokey and goofy and never that serious. This, however, is… kind of a serious ska album. There’s some real depth to some of the songs here in terms of their lyricism, and I really respect the attempt to try and make a socially conscious album with this soundscape, especially for 1988, well before ska hit the mainstream like a truck in the mid-90s.

When it works, it works REALLY well, and when it doesn’t work… it just kind of exists in a way where you can tell they needed a LITTLE more time to refine it. There’s really not a bad track here – I enjoyed all 41 minutes of this, but for as much as I respect their vision, it’s just not executed as well as I’d like all the way through. With that said, it’s executed really damn well for its time, and definitely set the tone for other bands to come in and really refine it based on their efforts here. I need to take a deeper dive to see if anyone stepped up to that plate.

Regardless of any of that, I thought this was still really, really good. There’s a lot of energy throughout this, and it’s just a damn fun listen for the most part. I think it’s just good enough to give it a 5 – again, a few tracks just don’t work as well, but sometimes it’s really apparent when they were padding for time, or if they sort of couldn’t figure out a proper ending for a song or two. However, I don't really care. It might be a 2 if you really hate trumpets, but it’s almost certainly no less than a 4 in my eyes. I’m definitely pleased with a 5 – I just enjoyed the hell out of it, and I’m very glad to discover this.

That’s a super easy 5.

Chrissie Hynde has been one of the most persistent banes of my trivia existence – I’ve never heard a song by Pretenders until listening through this album, but I’ll be damned if I haven’t been dragged and kicked into learning that Chrissie Hynde is their lead vocalist. Her vocal style on this album just feels super refreshing for some reason that I can’t quite grasp – the closest comparison I have is Alanis Morissette, and there are plenty of times throughout this album where I swear I’m hearing Alanis. I think it’s something to do with the ability to easily switch between a sort of soft spoken word and belting out on a dime.

Past all of that though, this is just an awesome sounding album from an instrumental standpoint – in many ways, this really does feel like the first album of the 1980s. It was recorded in the 70s, and didn’t get released until January of 1980, but this really feels like the first proper album to capture the sounds and stylings of 80s production in full force. A lot of the stuff on here sounds like it could be from any one year of the decade at any given point, and that’s really cool to me. I think the guitar and percussion both have their standout moments here, the guitar moreso, but when mixed with Chrissie’s vocals, it just clicks together perfectly.

I don’t think there’s a bad track on here; maybe a few duller moments, but I’d say this album keeps up the energy pretty much at all times. I really, really enjoyed this, and I’m glad I can finally put a sound to the trivia question that I usually miss. This was awesome. Very deserved 5.

I’m at a 3.

It’s not a bad album, but there’s just nothing super appealing about it to me; there’s good tracks here, but it’s very hard to get a real sense of a defined style and tone of this album. I’m a sucker for variety, but sometimes this album switches really harshly in terms of its tones, going from softer acoustic-driven stuff to harsh electric that’s really oddly mixed on a dime, and that leads to a real lack of cohesion that just sort of sours the album as an experience.

I don’t think there are any bad tracks here, but I just think the structure of the album in terms of this track order doesn’t work very well, and as far as the songs themselves go, I just don’t think many of them were as captivating as they could be. Obviously, this is their debut album, so I’ll go easier on them, but from what I remember of Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain, all the “flaws” (decisions I disagree with, really) were a lot more ironed out on that record, and it just made for a much tighter album that felt more cohesive.

Ultimately, this is fine, and it’s really solid 90s rock. Someone will get more out of this than I did, and I can easily see someone giving this a 4 or a rather generous 5, but I don’t think it’s any lower than a 3. I liked a lot of what’s here, it just wasn’t THAT good to go any higher than a 3.

It’s way fucking better than Haute de gamme, at least.

It’s a fucking 1.

Even without the child rape this guy was accused of in 2019, which is already going to give it a 1 regardless, this is just such a fucking boring album, my god. This is comprised of 58 FUCKING MINUTES of music that sounds like what you'd hear when they're showing b-roll footage of the zoo on a kids show.

The looping instrumentals that comprise the entirety of this album are not only egregiously long and tiresome and boring, but they’re just so fucking annoying to sit through. I talked about Kraftwerk sounding like an FL Studio loop once, but this literally IS one. I would wager to bet over half (if not all) of the backing instrumentals are like, 16 bars at most, on loop. Past that, he’s somehow delusional enough to think he can carry this album with his fucking vocals, while having not an inch of charisma to actually do it and while sounding like a constipated opera singer in training.

Honestly, the 58 minutes might be the worst part. By the time I got to the last track, I wrote the following down, and I think it sums up the crux of my feelings on the album:

“I truly do not care about any of this album anymore. The sooner I never have to listen to it, the better; it’s not even like it’s a bad album from a musical standpoint other than the obnoxiously obvious loops, it’s just painfully, painfully boring in a way that I haven’t felt since Maxinquaye, and honestly, the egregious nature of the looping may make this one even worse. However, at least this has a more positive and beachy upbeat tone throughout the runtime, so it doesn’t get like the depressingly sad type of “please end my suffering” boring. It just gets the ‘stuck at a 3-year-old’s birthday party with none of my friends & 7 other people in their 80s’ type of “please end my suffering” boring.”

Yeah, this is worse than Maxinquaye. This is the worst one we’ve gotten yet. Even if I were so kind as to give the music like, a 1.5 bumped up to a 2 because it “sounds happy,” this dude was convicted of child rape in 2019, so I just don’t even want to entertain the idea of a 2. It’s a bland, boring 1.

We better fucking get Dark Side of the Moon next or something.

I’m somewhere between a 4 and a 5, and I think I’ll have to talk myself into either one by the end of this little writeup.

I mean, I don’t have anything negative to say about the album, so that’s a huge plus; this is my first Wu-Tang anything ever, save for the occasional random feature spots from some Wu-Tang members on other projects. I feel kinda dumb for never really listening to them before – it’s not that I haven’t wanted to, it’s just that I’ve been too lazy to really commit to it for some reason.

This album is glowing with great lyricism across the board; really, really strong stuff for 1995, and probably some of the best lyrics of this period from ‘95-’96 where just about everyone in rap was on fire and hitting a creative peak. I think the flows are hypnotic, sometimes almost to a fault, and everyone gets a chance to really shine here – even though this is technically a GZA solo album, it distinctly feels like a Wu-Tang group effort to me based on the amount of features everyone gets.

The only partial knock I can give comes in the beats – there’s not a bad beat, but I do sometimes think the sort of moodier and darker atmosphere of the album gets punctuated just a little too harshly by how dry some beats feel. I’m not saying you have to suddenly brighten up the instrumental while we’re talking drug dealing and Chinese restaurants getting shot up, but it just sort of leads to a sterilized style that stops some tracks from really sticking out more than others, which isn’t great from the perspective of listening to the full album front to back.

With all of that written down though, I think the positives deeply outweigh the completely nitpicky negatives, and I’m gonna go ahead and give this a 5 – it’s a really enjoyable experience from front to back, and it really does have some of the best lyricism I’ve heard from this era. Even if the beats are a little dry at times, that never once takes away from the actual tracks themselves; they just blend in a little too often at times, but that’s probably a me thing more than anything else. This was damn good.

I’m at a 4. I need a hug.

It’s just a sad album, you know? Right from the rip, “Novocaine for the Soul” is an obvious drug addiction parallel, and the album never really gets happier from there – the big peak of positivity is probably “My Beloved Monster,” and that might just be because it was used in Shrek.

Seriously, the back half of this album is just a rough dose of suburban reality that never really brightens itself up. It’s a bold fucking choice, and it’s one I really deeply respect; this is a somewhat thought-provoking album for 1996. Taking this shit head on without really pulling any punches as to the nature of social anxiety and a desire to feel like one belongs stands out in the sort of commercialized rock and pop that was starting to come back into vogue around this time.

I don’t think I can give it a 5; there’s a few tracks that hit really well lyrically and vocally, but are supplemented by instrumentals that don’t do too much to stick out, even when they get their little solo moments. Those types of tracks are really prevalent around the middle of the album, and they do make the experience slow down just a little bit too much, but this is still a really strong album. It can read as a bit generic and a little too angsty and moody in that teenage sort of way, but I think it’s possibly more relatable now in 2024 than it was in 1996 as far as the social dynamics go.

It’s a very good 4, and it could be a 5 for people who really fucking relate to some of the subject matter here. It could also be a 2 for people who don’t relate to it at all and want to hear this guy shut up about his poor shitty life. For my tastes, I just liked it a lot, and I thought the storytelling and tone of the album was really well done. And now, I will go get that hug.

I’m at a 4.5 that I’m going to bump up to a 5 because I just really, really enjoyed this.

I have to be honest to myself with these ratings – I really thought about going for a 4 because “well, some of the outros are a little long, and it’s a little cheesy” but I quickly realized that for my listening experience, I didn’t really care about them in the moment that much. I cared enough to notice them, sure, but they didn’t take away from my overall enjoyment of the album while I was listening to it.

This is just a delight for me – I think I enjoyed it as much as I did because it’s kind of unabashedly cheesy. This is early 80s production at a sort of plateau between the direction of the late 70s and the growing use of synthesizers that would really come to define the mid-80s. This album really tows the line between jazzy soundscapes and some great synth work without overdoing either one. The mixing on this album is as good as audiophiles make it out to be – this is CRISP for 1982, and I guess it’s a testament that the album has never really had to be remastered like that, you know?

Those soundscapes are supplemented really well by his vocals – I know Donald Fagen was one of the members of Steely Dan, but I’ve never heard a Steely Dan album. I have to imagine one will come up, because I want to hear more stuff like this. I think I.G.Y. is a fantastic opener, and a great tonesetter for an album that never really loses steam, save for the occasional long outro, or extended periods where the soundscape doesn’t shift as much as it could.

This isn’t a flawless album, but I don’t think there’s too much I would tweak here. The variety of styles here is super cool, from the moodier & jazzier stuff that comprises the first few tracks, to the arguably city pop-esque “The Goodbye Look,” and the almost Sinatra-esque “Walk Between Raindrops” – slow that track down a bit and you can hear him crooning out those lyrics.

It was just a really fun album for me, I dunno. I could totally see someone getting entirely bored of this and giving it a 2 or a 3, though. It’s gonna be a mixed bag for some people, but it hits on everything I like. Sometimes, when you enjoy an album this much, it’s hard not to go with a 5, and I just feel like I’ve got to give it one. Certainly no less than a 4 for me.

I’m only at a 3, which is kinda disappointing.

I don’t think it’s a bad album; I’d recommend it, honestly. It just never really clicked for me as a fully cohesive one from front to back. I think there’s a lot of repetition here, but it’s really supplemented by an energetic vocal performance and a lot of great production tricks. However, sometimes those production tricks either didn’t hit as well on a few tracks, or became an outright hindrance with some awkward mixing between the percussion and the vocals or the synths that felt just out of balance enough to be distracting.

I think I liked this album better when it was more focused on being a sort of pseudo-dance record; the heavier beats, the deeper percussion mixed closer to the ears, and the vocals that had just enough processing to blend in without feeling too overdone, and that’s about half of the album. In other words, I liked the songs that feel distinctly modern and about 7 years ahead of schedule for 2007 – super experimental stuff for the time that feels very common now. The other half ranges from “just not really doing it for me” to outright bad on “Hussel” (just REALLY flat for me) and “20 Dollar” (extremely overdone production, and I really did not like the “Where Is My Mind?” interpolation, even though I’m normally a sucker for that sort of thing).

When the album hits, it hits really well – Bamboo Banga is a good (if slightly long) opener, Boyz feels like a great sports hype up track, Paper Planes is an all-timer, and XR2 is a perfect 90s club throwback. For me, it just only hits about half the time, and that’s why I’m at a 3. For someone else, I can hear how it might be a 4 or even a 5, but for my tastes, it just never got up there. Very solid 3 though.

I’m at a 4.5 that I desperately wish I could leave there, but I’ll go up to a 5.

This is a fucking great album; I’ve heard of Blondie, but I didn’t think I had actually ever heard Blondie, and then One Way or Another came on and I fucking did a spittake. Normally, I have a moment like that once every few weeks in this experience; some song that’s weaved its way into the pop culture soundtrack jumpscares me and I go “oh, this is THAT song” and I get all giddy and happy to finally know the source. They fucking did it to me again later in the album with “Heart of Glass” and I just kinda lost it laughing.

I do wish this album had ended on Heart of Glass though; I think the last 2 tracks are a little bit more “filler” than closer material; they’re not bad tracks at all, but I would’ve been way more receptive to them if they had been placed earlier in the album. They just don’t structurally fit the album as much to me – there’s a few tracks that do feel out of place in terms of the track order, and that’s sort of why I was wavering between a 4 and 5 as an album experience.

However, I think it would be a bit odd to give this only a 4 after I enjoyed it as much as I did; I don’t think this album misses a single beat (literally) from an instrumental or vocal standpoint. From a production standpoint, some of these songs feel right out of the mid-80s instead of the late 70s, so that's fun. Sometimes the lyrics are a little odd, but they’re never outright bad, save for the really deflating “I Know but I Don't Know”. That song feels like it was written by a high school sophomore having to write a poem after procrastinating all day and just spitting that out about 2 hours before the start of class. I say all that, and I think the song has one of the very best instrumentals on the album, so even when the album misses, it still hits.

So, yeah, I’m up to a 5. I do think the track order could’ve been tweaked a bit, and maybe even a song or two could’ve been cut out for not fitting as well with the rest of the album, but that’s for other people to decide on a more definitive track order (other than ending on “Heart of Glass” as the last track no matter what). It’s just a really fun album; it’s 40 minutes of hard hitting rock, anchored by a damn strong voice and some great instrumentation. Highly recommended listen, and I’m totally fine with the bump up to a 5. It's definitely no less than a 4.

I’m at a 4.5, and I’ll give it the bump up to a 5.

It’s just really fucking good blues; a few tracks didn’t quite mix with my sensibilities (some of them are a little long, a little repetitive, etc), but I enjoyed this enough that I can recognize that some of the tracks that didn’t work as well for me could very very easily hit for someone else, and that’s why I’ll bump it up to a 5.

When this backing band behind Muddy Waters enters the flow state (which happens plenty of times on this album), they sucked me in just as easily as the listener; when they’re in that mode, and everything is rolling, with the guitars on fire, the deep percussion nailing every beat, and the instruments riffing like there’s no tomorrow, while Muddy’s voice hits its deepest Ray Charles-inspired tones, there’s really nothing like it. It is a mood that is sort of impossible to describe, but very easy to be aware of, and it’s incredibly fun.

This album enters the flow state several times, and it just makes for 45 of the smoothest and fastest minutes I can remember. There’s not a bad track here, just a few that didn’t click with my tastes, but it’s so damn good that I’d be a fool not to give it the 5. It’s a very, very good album, and a highly recommended listen. This was great.

I’m at a 4.5 that I’ll bump down to a 4.

There’s a big chance this album will hit way less on any subsequent relistens, and I’m fully prepared for that to be the case – for a first go-around though, I’m just a sucker for this style, and I think this is 42 minutes of it being done really, really well.

The big thing this album has going for it on its Wikipedia page is that it was “voted the third-most overrated album ever made in a 2005 BBC public poll,” and… that might be kind of fair. I don’t think this is an album that should’ve changed the world or anything, and if it did light the UK on fire, then that’s sort of odd. I don’t think it does anything so special that it should be near a “top 100 albums of all time” list or something similar. Within its own genre and style, I’m sure there are better albums than this, and I’m sure we’ll get to some of them.

With that said, I’m just a sucker for this style – this is a great Arctic Monkeys album, even if this came a year and a half before the Arctic Monkeys dropped their first proper studio album. There’s some serious standouts here; I think “Can’t Stand Me Now” is a hell of an opener, I think “Music When the Lights Go Out” has a really nice sort of local bar feel before the instrumentation kicks in (without distracting from the atmosphere, mind you), and the obvious 60s throwback that is “What Katie Did” just appealed right to my cheesy little musical sensibilities.

I’ll give the album extra credit; I think this is one of the few times an album has actually gotten me on a hidden track, even in the streaming era. The acoustic piece that ends the album is really, really nicely recorded, and I think it’s just a very quaint finish to a rather fun album. The energy never really lets up, and I don’t think there’s a bad track here. It’s not perfect; a lot of this style is stuck in the early 2000s, and it does have that sort of “this fits right on a Tony Hawk soundtrack” smell that sometimes works in its favor and sometimes doesn’t… but I think it works more often than not. I just really, really enjoyed this, but not enough to bump it up to a 5. Very fun album; very good 4.