Reviews by guggmo

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

I guess it’s time to mind the Buzzcocks then. I didn’t really know what to expect going in, but I’m pleased with what’s here – highly energetic power pop / post-punk, with an occasional ska lean at times, yet feeling like a tamed down Sex Pistols with more of a Beatles-driven influence behind it. One’s enjoyment of this album will boil down to a tolerance for repetition; normally, mine is a bit low, but most of the tracks here tend to find ways to shake that repetition up so that it never gets too overly stale. For the most part, it succeeds, save for the singular miss of “Fiction Romance”, which barely went anywhere for its entire runtime.

This album’s biggest strength in avoiding feeling too repetitive is the pace of most of the first 10 tracks; just 3 of them are longer than 2:45, so it all moves quickly. Even the last track, “Moving Away from the Pulsebeat” doesn’t really feel like it’s 7 minutes long, since half of it is just an extended drum / guitar solo that plays out the album in a jam session. Lots of love songs, obviously (and weirdly enough, more valid car hate), but the simplicity makes the tracks work for me. Yeah, “Love Battery” is just a double entendre about his dick for 2 minutes, but when you supplement that with a really energetic instrumental, it’s a lot easier to just rock the fuck out to the music once the meaning becomes overly clear. That’s why “Fiction Romance” didn’t work for me; the meaning was clear in a single verse, but the instrumental went nowhere. It’s the only track that really fumbles that formula, as the rest all clicked for me.

Hence, a 4.5 that I’ll bump up to a 5 – the floor here is obviously a 3, especially if you catch the “Sexless Pistols” vibe & find this to just be worse. I don’t think it’s as good as “Never Mind the Bollocks”, but it’s not trying to be that album, at least not in totality. It’s a slightly more friendly take on a similar style, and one that manages to rock out all the same if you buy into what they’re selling. I happened to like it, and I think it earns its spot on the list.

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

Perhaps the most UK-centric pick of the entire list, somehow. Julian Cope is the former lead singer for The Teardrop Explodes (we got Kilimanjaro & it was totally fine), & someone with a deep enough love for Scott Walker to curate an entire selection of Scott’s music just to try and rehabilitate his image in the early 1980s. He’s here with a 76-minute art rock album to tell us exactly what he thinks about the world. Going in, I didn’t have high hopes, if I’m being honest. It already felt bloated & preachy & a little self-serving, and that was just from the cover art & synopsis alone.

I’m pleased to announce that my low hopes were quickly surpassed in a way that made me feel foolish for doubting the pick here – this is not “Kilimanjaro”-esque at all, with Julian Cope & the team he put together crafting a wide net of musical styles & topics to touch on, and for a 76 minute album, I’m VERY pleased to announce that it only feels just a little too long as opposed to being unbearably too long. Hell, I found myself thinking some tracks could go on longer to really sell more of the instrumental atmosphere / vocal performances at hand here. If you’ve got me that invested in what you’re saying & how you’re choosing to say it, you’ve done something right.

It’s a UK-centric pick in terms of how Dimery & friends got here, yes, but it’s also a UK-centric album in terms of how much Julian Cope seems to fucking despise Margaret Thatcher. There’s at least 3 or 4 tracks here devoted to hating on her, and I can’t help but respect the commitment. For the most part, however, this is an album loosely preaching about the climate issues that were apparent even back then. Obviously, we have a bit of a crisis on our hands with how much water we’re currently using to create some Suno-driven slop & a whole bunch of other LLM related issues, so it seems like Julian’s words fell on deaf ears here. He did focus a little much on hating car dependency, to be fair, but that was incredibly valid back then & something we haven’t solved now, given that they’re adding yet another lane to that highway right by you that’ll solve everything. You know it’s coming.

When this album isn’t tackling climate issues & the horrors of predicting 35 years ago what has clearly come to pass today, it’s talking about other decently relevant topics for the time; “Double Vegetation” seems to tackle the Western desire to stop the spread & influence of Islam that was carried out in the Gulf War invasion & certainly into today. “Hanging Out & Hung Up on the Line” is apparently about anxiety bubbling up in potent forms when you need it the least, and I’d say that’s pretty damn relatable. “Safesurfer” tackles sex in the age of AIDS, & while it’s a bit one-note, the instrumental atmosphere is rad as hell. “If You Love Me at All” is also a bit one-note, but gaslighting like that has clearly stayed the same. “Soldier Blue” is about the government crossing the boundaries of peaceful protest; arguably, more relevant than ever.

I’m just impressed, really; there’s an almost Beck-like quality to Julian’s work here, with this album touching on everything from grunge to ragtime to trip-hop and somehow feeling totally cohesive in spite of everything, managing to make all 76 minutes flow in a way that never REALLY bit at me. Obviously, there’s some longer outros & a bit of one-note repetition in ways that could’ve been trimmed down, but sometimes, simmering in that repetition gets the point across a little more. “Drive, She Said” wouldn’t feel the same if you didn’t have to get nagged at for a good chunk of the track, nor would “Las Vegas Basement” hit the same way if you didn’t have to hear the guitar solo go on just a little too long. I understand why this has a 2.77 on the site, as it’s a bit of a commitment to go past the surface level & really dig into these tracks in a more meaningful way. One might also just say that it’s trite nonsense, but that really disregards all of the effort put in to make this appealing to a casual listener as well. Seriously, there’s great soundscapes & instrumentals across the board here.

Overall, I’m at a 4.5 bumped up to a 5, if only because it is a bit long & some tracks do get a little repetitive, along with some rehashed topics in ways that don’t add too much to the album. I think there’s a world where, had this been tightened up a little more, it would’ve been a really big album. At the very least, if anything other than “Pristeen” & its slightly oversaturated wall of noise had been the opener, maybe people would’ve taken more kindly to this album from the get go. I can’t think of a more natural opener though, so what do I know? Regardless of its flaws, it’s a surprisingly strong album, at least compared to the expectations I had going in, and I think it deserves the bump up to a 5. Not bad at all, Julian.

I’m definitely at a 5.

I can already hear it now; this video game-y acid house crap that invaded the UK in 1989 strikes again, and everyone is just SO over having to hear another band do it in a way that isn’t as good as Depeche Mode. I get it, I really do. Unfortunately for those people, this is exactly the vibe I fuck with. Yes, it’s a little heavy on the love songs in a way that makes me wish there was more variety in the song topics, & yes, a lot of these tracks do have a similar feel if you really break them down to their core essentials. However, I would argue that this is similar to what I call the “Nintendo effect”. Take any Mario or Zelda game, & nitpick all the little tacky parts of the game design you don’t like, and you’ll fully convince yourself that it wasn’t anywhere near as good as you thought it was. To some degree, those critiques are generally valid.

I would pose, however, that you were NEVER that nitpicky while you were actually playing it. You never dissected it down too deeply. You were running & jumping & having a good time. Nintendo’s principle towards games is the belief that as long as you’re having fun in the moment, the flaws don’t matter that much. I think this album is the exact same way; if you were bopping your head along & tapping your feet & fucking with the bass / drums / guitar while listening & having a good time, then New Order has clearly succeeded here. You can look at it after the fact & come to the conclusion that it might’ve been a little samey for 40 minutes and never got past the surface level of “I just wanna be in love regardless of how much life hurts”, and that’s all true. Did you care while you were in the moment though? Probably not, or at least not in a way that actually felt actively bad.

If it’s already not your style or genre to begin with, then that’s valid, and the ceiling here is probably a 3. If it is your style & you’re tearing it down after the fact, you’re probably overanalyzing too much. This is just 40 minutes of fun acid house with a little bit of lyrical substance to it. No, it’s not as good as “Violator” or either of the Pet Shop Boys albums with an acid house soundscape, but it’s still something I fuck with heavily. My biggest nitpick is just a few songs being a little lyrically confusing – I know I just ripped into the idea of overanalyzing these tracks, but some of them do feel like they’re harder to grasp conceptually, namely “Guilty Partner”. My smaller nitpick is that Bernard Sumner could project just a little more on the choruses. Some of them don’t hit as hard. Those are things that are both easy to notice in the moment, but I barely cared about them, because everything surrounding them just worked great. Ultimately, I’m at a 5, simple as that.

P.S.: I’m very surprised that this is what emerged from Joy Division’s remains after the death of Ian Curtis. I think I owe “Unknown Pleasures” a relisten, and I’m very eager to get both “Closer” & “Low-Life” now.

I think I’m at a 10.

First: you need headphones. It won’t hit the same without it. I’ll be quick about this. The instrumentation is fabulous across the board, maintaining an R.E.M.-esque vibe with a bit of orchestral-leaning sophistication behind it, while blending in a multitude of production tricks that would define indie rock for years to come. Yes, Wayne Coyne’s vocals aren’t super impressive, but they’re very effective, especially when they do any kind of harmonization. I think the lyricism is simple but great, and if we’re using just the first 12 tracks as a 50 minute package, I don’t think there’s a skip or a flaw here. The sense of optimistic melancholy that underlines this album is appealing to me. For 2026, given the nightmare we’re in, it just feels comforting to have a mirror of sorts, or at the very least, something to provide hope for the pendulum to swing back in a way where a Superman could someday swoop in, & a lovely example of sympathy towards being able to experience the ups & downs of life, no matter how painful it can all get or however hopelessly small one might feel.

I really can’t type out more than that. Sure, if you overanalyze the lyrics here, you could find bigger issues that make them look childish & trite, but I’ll take a finely crafted kids meal with a great taste over a word salad that’s too overformulated for its own good. To call this album a kids meal feels like an insult though; you have to be in the right headspace to catch this thing, and more than that, you need a sense of empathy to be able to feel these tracks past their very surface. Granted, something like “Buggin’” is just kinda goofy (yet lovely) regardless, but I digress. I think it’s a lovely 50 minutes, and well worth all of the praise given to it nearly 30 years ago. I’ll let someone else break down the whole thing track-by-track if they want; I think it’s one where you just have to hear it to understand it. For me, it’s a 10.

I’m at a 2.

It’s competent. It was probably solidly fun in 1983 when the bar wasn’t as high. It’s barely compelling by modern standards & nowadays, tremendously plain. Malcolm McLaren’s horrendous racial insensitivity as the lead white vocalist constantly doing an African accent aside, the production work here feels a bit slapdash. One might call it “early hip-hop”, as a chance to forgive the weirdness. I will graciously choose to call it “accidental plunderphonics”, as a lot of these tracks really settle into their beats / instrumentals in the first minute & rarely give themselves a sense of more entertaining progression. The soundscapes here, however, for 1983, are all genuinely kinda cool, and at least a little ahead of pace. I never knew “Buffalo Gals” is what Eminem interpolated for “Without Me”, nor did I know it was one of the first major UK hiphop hits in general, and one of the first to incorporate record scratching in the beat. It barely qualifies as a rap track nowadays, but based on who’s sampled it, it’s clear there’s at least something intriguing to the production that can catch the ears in a way that might warrant a very slight head bop. That’s true for most of the album, with a lot of famous artists sampling tracks here.

The problem, of course, is that the intrigue lasts for a measure or two, and then relies on it for the entire track as a crutch before throwing the World’s Famous Supreme Team with an interstitial radio recording that occasionally repeats. This album’s biggest curse is that it follows the exact same formula for the whole thing, at least in the structure of each track. That’s why I call it “accidental plunderphonics”, since the samples coming out of those intriguing measures are all far more compelling on other better produced beats & albums. I won’t deny that this probably did have an impact on introducing hip-hop to the UK, to a degree, but the parts of this album that comprise “hiphop” are far overstated compared to the rest of the album, which is uncredited African instrumentation, a crummy Spanish song, a track where Malcolm McLaren practically sucks himself off in “Punk It Up”, and a completely goofy closer in “Duck for the Oyster”, which is a square dance track with a very loose trip-hop vibe mixed in. I don’t think they’re all that bad, but… damn, they really let a white guy who managed & got kicked out by the Sex Pistols be the initial representative for this stuff? What were they doing, man?

I’m almost inclined to give it a 1, but there are a handful of moments here where the tracks don’t feel that dismally plain (and one surprisingly strong beat / vibe for 1983 on “World’s Famous”). No, Malcolm McLaren’s relatively racist singing is not as good as his promoting skills, but as far as picking the right team of producers to put this together, he at least put together a competent enough group that were able to make some decently memorable stuff. At the very least, it’s memorable stuff as made famous by other people putting in the work to expand & improve on this album’s rather shaky, if fine (& stolen) foundation. I don’t think it’s all that bad. It’s just very, very plain, and a bit boring at times. If you got something out of it, more power to you. I just never really elevated past a head bop that faded away before the tracks ended. Hence, a 2.

I’m at a 4.5 that I’ll just barely bump up to a 5, though I'd prefer to leave it there.

In order to really enjoy this album, you have to play along with its conceit; you need to be like an audience member here. Tom Waits is in more of a stream of consciousness mode here; still lyrically sharp & one hell of a storyteller when he’s in his groove, but not as concise about any specific meanings to these tracks, save for a few rather clear ones. This is more of a conversational piece, meant to snapshot slices of life that Tom Waits has in his head. It is not one to dig into deeply & analyze like it’s one of the other 4 albums he has on the list. It’s one where you’re meant to listen along with the ride like you’re in the crowd, and be charmed by this raspy-voiced man & the jazz band behind him. For the third album he ever released, it’s a pretty big swing. For my tastes, it’s a swing that hits more often than it misses, as long as you can buy into Tom’s approach.

The problem with Tom’s approach here is that he doesn’t start to find his sense of charisma with this crowd until “Better Off Without a Wife”, & he only fully grabs them in by “Warm Beer and Cold Women”. The early parts of this album, where the TV sitcom-esque audience are following along like they were paid to be there, feel a little rough, as Tom just doesn’t have his timing down. It’s trying to be like one of Johnny Cash’s live albums, but without the realism behind it, down to the intros of each track. This album is rougher early on, and while I was charmed by Bob Dylan’s “uselessly conversational” approach back on the final track of “Time Out of Mind”, some of that same uselessly conversational tone just doesn’t feel as effective in the first few tracks.

It does, however, feel a bit more effective after “Warm Beer and Cold Women”. Once Tom finds himself a bit more & vibes with the crowd better, that uselessly conversational tone just feels more compelling. Granted, part of that is because I could only hear Macho Man Randy Savage inhabiting Tom Waits on some of the later tracks here, but for the most part, I just found the back half of the album more charismatic. The band’s a little more in sync, able to riff with Tom’s vocal approaches more easily. The songs don’t feel driven by complaints, giving a lighter & easier tone to the back half that I enjoyed a bit more, even on its sadder tracks. I also just happened to buy into the vibe a lot more, going so far as to mime smoking a cigarette while listening. It’s method acting, for sure, but it really helped to set the scene in a much more fruitful way.

The back half of this album is strong enough to just barely get this up to a 5. I do think some of these tracks go a little long & a lot of the pauses on some of these tracks only serve to pad out an atmosphere that doesn’t really feel as potent as Tom & the band are going for. This definitely could’ve been cut down by a bit. However, when it works, it works really well. If anything, I’m just impressed that the last Tom Waits album we’ll get ends on him literally saying goodbye to a crowd, looping around on that dive bar atmosphere that most of his later albums give. It’s a very fitting way to end his albums for our group, and I just can’t help but bring this up to a 5 as a result. It also helps that “Better Off Without a Wife”, “Warm Beer and Cold Women”, “Nobody” & “Big Joe and Phantom 309” are all great tracks.

As far as Tom Waits goes, I never gave him anything lower than a 4; one of those was a 3.5 bumped up to a 4, but still. I’m very impressed, given that I never knew the guy existed before starting the 1001 Albums, and I now find him to be one of the more potent storytellers on the entire list. Is 5 albums overkill? Well, maybe, but at least he brought something new & different to the table every time, compared to Elvis Costello doing the same thing 6 times over. Seriously, going from this album to “Bone Machine” 17 years later & still managing to sound relevant & worthy for the era is impressive as hell. I’m sad this is the last time we’ll get him, but I feel like I’ve got some listening to do on my own (probably “Mule Variations”, if anything). Hell of a run.

I’m at a 10. It’s just a great, great album.

I’ve never heard of Elbow until now. I've also never heard a set of tracks that so accurately capture both the struggle & delight that comes in the search for comfort until now. At its very core, this album is about trying to find comfortability, whether it’s in terms of heartbreak, total romance, financial stability via rigging a horse race, breaking the trauma of a family cycle, or coping after the death of a friend. This is a wide variety of tracks meant to cover the extent of that search, and every single one of them are all brilliantly written & performed. Instrumentally, we have a Coldplay record with a Peter Gabriel lean; the depth of the instrumental work here in terms of how it enhances the mood of each track cannot be understated. It’s one where I can’t totally find the words to bring it all together, but when this album lifts up or drops down, it’s got a sense of weight to it that I haven’t heard from an album on the list in a while. Guy Garvey’s vocals carry that weight well, being able to shift between a softer tone that feels almost like Winnie the Pooh mixed with Jack Johnson & a more impactful tone that, once again, feels a lot like Peter Gabriel.

I think that’s all I need to say, really. If you like Peter Gabriel’s sort of “broken heart art” approach to music, if you enjoy Coldplay’s sense of musical scale & atmosphere (at least from their “A Rush of Blood to the Head” era), and if you can catch the lyricism to the extent of getting the general vibe / intent of each track, then this will be 54 minutes that glide by wonderfully. If you’re not in the mood for it, or if you think it’s sappy contrite nonsense meant to appeal to the softies of the world… I don’t know what to tell you. The floor here should be a 4, bare minimum, solely on account of some outros going a little long. For me, the emotional push & pull of the album combined with the technical skill at hand here leaves me at a 10. This might be the best Mercury Prize winning pick on the entire list, and it’s one of the best ones to pop up so far, even 876 albums deep. This was delightful, this was inventive, this was happy, this was sad, and perhaps most of all, this was just comforting. I need to hear more of Elbow, I think.

I’m at a 3.5 that I’ll bump up to a 4, though I think I’d prefer to stay at a 3.5.

It’s a good set of tracks. By the back half, though, it’s just not a very cohesive album, at least in terms of a natural track to track flow. Everything through “Two Doves” flows pretty well, and while it’s all a bit strange & slightly disjointed instrumentally, it has a charm to it. It’s trying to say something, but it doesn’t feel like it’s hitting the “big important artsy” vibe that’s stopped a lot of 2009 albums in their tracks on this list. It’s just got a fun experimental vibe to it, with some fascinating ways to frame things. “Cannibal Resource” is about the impending climate crisis being met with a universal expectation of constant familiarity from our lazy society. “Temecula Sunrise” is about the artsy hipsters taking over the rich neighborhoods of the world. “The Bride”... really doesn’t wanna get married, I guess. That one’s a bit eerie. “Stillness is The Move” is an anthem towards finding joy in being content instead of constantly moving upwards, & “Two Doves” is one of the more unique ways I’ve seen to describe a relationship starting & ending. It’s all verbosely written, to a degree, but the execution is tight enough where even if you can barely get the intent, the vibes just kinda hit right. It’s an album that feels like it’s challenging all sorts of norms, both socially & musically, and through the first 5 tracks, it succeeds well.

With “Useful Chamber”, though, the way it packs its wide variety of genres into a 7 minute stretch is cool as fuck, but it just doesn’t feel quite as tight as the early execution in the album. It’s a good track, don’t get me wrong, but it’s a bit long & a bit too abstract. The concept of following a woman who sees the world with new & inventive eyes is cool, but there’s not enough meat on the bones to flesh it out in a more effective way.

“No Intention” is where the album really started to lose me a bit; the repetition in the instrumental is one thing, creating a cyclical sort of musical tone, but it’s met with a cynical lyrical tone. I think the idea of “I think, but I am not sure if I truly am” is fascinating. It’s just not very effectively argued here, with thought & existence themselves boiled down to punishments & aberrations in the greater scheme of whatever life is meant to be. It’s too defeatist after the early “let’s revolutionize the world” energy the earlier tracks give.

“Remade Horizon” is cool, but I had to use my imagination a bit more to really get something out of the track. The idea of being loosely haunted by someone you’re desperate to reunite with, almost to the point of a slightly broken reshaping of your world, is very interesting to me. It just feels like it needs another verse or two to really shape out the vision of the track, and match the same energy as earlier on. A track about wanting to reshape the whole world coming after a very defeatist one doesn’t flow very well though.

“Fluorescent Half Dome” is about… something. I think it’s about wanting to go beyond the boundaries of perception & judgement, and still searching for a lover who will match that. It IS a cool concept, but the delivery just doesn’t feel like it has the same unique impact as it did earlier in the album. It feels a bit more forced to me, for whatever reason; something about the instrumentation just never clicked in a believable way, & the actual lyricism just felt too idealized for its own good, almost in a smugly achieved way. It didn’t really hit as a closing track to me.

All of that said, the strength of the first 5 tracks here & the overall enjoyment borne out of this strange mix of eclectic styles (a hipster-y Beatles with Bjork’s sensibilities & a Peter Gabriel-esque loose prog lean at times) leaves me at a 3.5 that I’ll just barely bump up to a 4. I liked it! I do wish the album were a little tighter in the back half, or at the very least, stuck to its more appealing & consistent theme of a “quiet revolution”, but I do think it’s worth being on the list. It’s good, challenging music, done in a relatively digestible way. It’s certainly got more heart than some of the other 2009 albums we’ve had on the list & I’m glad I heard it.

It’s well above a 5. It’s not quite a 10, though it could possibly get up there someday.

It’s not my favorite Bowie album we’ve gotten so far (probably a tie between Blackstar & Station to Station), but it is the most expertly crafted of his albums in terms of a natural flow, and one that’s so consistently strong without any kind of miss in between that I’d be remiss not to agree with the consensus that it’s probably his best album. Granted, I don’t fully understand the plot here – obviously, Ziggy Stardust’s entire personality being consumed by fame & leading the vain angel to fall back to Earth & seemingly die is the overarching story, but I feel like there’s a lot of little gaps my brain never filled in around the middle (When did the Spiders get recruited as his band? Did he really die?). It’s a little bit loose conceptually, but if you’re solely looking at the plot, you’ve failed the test.

David Bowie’s driving force, and the one that sells this album, is the ability to fully slip into the role of a musical savior. 6 years prior, John Lennon had said the Beatles were bigger than Jesus. I don’t know exactly what David’s reaction was to that, but I can’t help but wonder if it caused any kind of spark to get to this album. Ziggy Stardust, as a character, is a fascinating figure, and one that sort of feels like the anti-thesis of Bowie in his later years. One’s out in the open accepting the status of fame; Bowie himself retreated from it, in a way. With the musical prowess at hand on each of these tracks, it’s easy to believe in both Bowie as a musician starting his peak, and Ziggy Stardust as a character who can be the biggest rockstar in the world. They work hand in hand, & I do feel like there’s a lot of David Bowie embedded into Ziggy. His charisma & flair for showmanship makes the album, & when you combine that confidence with great songwriting, catchy melodies, and a concept strong enough to nearly be made into a musical, you end up with a recipe for a great album.

It’s futile to go track by track here – going in, I only knew “Moonage Daydream” & “Starman” as the two monster hits, but the entire album ranges from good to great and beyond. “Rock ‘n’ Roll Suicide” is a great closer, and even outside of the story, just a genuinely strong plea for strength. I initially perceived it as Ziggy’s shelf life as an artist coming to end, yet reaching out to meaningfully help at least one person before the 5 years are up, but it seems to be about Ziggy’s final concert where he gets mutilated by antimatter energy beings on stage. David was on the good shit back then, huh? Regardless, it was worth the 874 day wait to get here, and I think it’s easily deserving of something higher than a 5. The only reason I’m not at a 10 is because the album never hit at that much of a deeper level for me (i.e., being DEEPLY synced with Bowie here), but I think it’ll get there someday. I can’t wait to get “Heroes”.

I’m a little higher than a 5.

It’s just a great R.E.M. album to go out on. The additional experimentation in styles is a good evolution from “Document”, adding a lot more range & versatility throughout this album. It also feels like a natural predecessor to the brilliance of “Automatic for the People”, as Michael Stipe’s songwriting begins to carry a lot more weight here. There’s still the same cryptic vibe to everything that was apparent on “Murmur” & occasionally so on “Document”, but it’s more boxed in to give the tracks a necessary sense of direction, enhanced with a bit more of a visual flair in the lyricism, making the abstract feel a lot more enjoyable to explore. It all works a lot more for my brain.

Obviously, Michael Stipe’s vocals are as good as ever, but I’m just impressed by the instrumentation feeling as dynamic as it does. It’s still distinctly R.E.M., and with a bit of a grunge lean, but without the sort of generationally carried grief that underlined “Automatic for the People”. It feels like Michael is trying to find himself a bit here, with his own ambitions finally catching up to the success of the band, yet creating a crossroads as a result. This album constantly feels like it’s asking questions without intending to look for answers; something like “Pop Song 89”, for example, feels like a track about the inability to recognize those that feel close to you, but without really deciding if that’s a good or bad thing. Same goes for “Stand”; sure, it’s smarter to be more aware of the directions your life is moving, but how often are you REALLY aware of it, and does it matter that much if it’s going well?

It’s that ability to explore the abstract that the band has created & seek your own answers to the questions being posed, enhanced by the instrumentation behind it, that makes this my favorite of the pre-”Automatic for the People” albums on the list. I can now fully see how R.E.M. only went up from here, and while they went up in a different way first that isn’t on the list (it is CRIMINAL that “Out of Time” isn’t here), this feels like the first domino to fall in a legacy defining way. It’s a little higher than a 5 for me, and maybe someday, it could get up to a 10.

As far as R.E.M. goes, maybe I need to relisten to “Murmur”, because their albums are all 5’s or higher otherwise. I’m very glad they have this much representation on the list, and I feel a bit sad that their legacy, at least in the modern pop culture conscious, is relegated mostly to “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (and I Feel Fine)” & loose memories of “Everybody Hurts” vines. I know they’re done & they’ve said they’ll never make a comeback, but something needs to happen to boost their cache a bit more. Hell, maybe they can ride the biopic train or something. Regardless, it’s been a real delight, and I need to seek out even more of these guys.

I’m practically at a 10.

The only reason I’m not definitively at a 10 is because “Run for Your Life” feels a bit petty / overly harsh as a closing track, especially coming off of the lovely trifecta of “In My Life”, “Wait”, & “If I Needed Someone”, all of which feel like tracks with a singular devotion towards love, which the Beatles preached about finding & sharing to the world on “The Word” just a bit earlier. It really feels like it goes against most of the album to that point, and while it’s not an especially bad track (quite good, honestly, even with the taboo lyricism), it just doesn’t thematically fit well as a closer, or on the album at all really.

That said, I totally hear why this is the first Beatles album with across-the-board critical praise: their melodies have improved, their songwriting added a lot of emotional depth, & their instrumentation is starting to move towards the bigger energy & bombast that would feel especially present on Sgt. Pepper’s. The jury is out, at least for me, on if Revolver has that energy present, since I haven’t heard it yet. That’s the last Beatles album we’ll get to as a group, and I really cannot wait to get it. I see no point in going track to track here, since everyone has analyzed all of these tracks up & down for 61 years. They still hold up perfectly, even with that much time between, and the list of influences that stem from this point onward feel apparent. “If I Needed Someone”, for example, feels like a La’s track, and you can make connections like this for most, if not all of the tracks here. Bob Dylan’s influence rubbed off on these guys, and with the harmonizations here, it’s no wonder the Beach Boys & Brian Wilson felt compelled to make something like Pet Sounds.

It’s ironic that an album that sharpened so much iron down the musical tree of influence is named after rubber, but I don’t think it’s a stretch to call this one of the most important albums ever made. Hence, a 10, even with that little snag at the end. I’m a broken record when it comes to my surprise at how much I’m appreciating the actual substance of the Beatles’ discography past the hit singles at this point, but they really have been that good. “Revolver” better be that damn good.

I’m a’a 3.

This album’s big issue is its inability to separate itself from the base of each track; a great rock/metal band ala AC/DC can do something t’ keep a track memorable / energetic throughout. These tracks all just kinda find a peak and sit in it, making those peaks feel less effective. When the peaks are less effective & the tracks plateau too early in terms of their energy, the progression of each track just doesn’t really play well to the ears. Combine that with each of the 10 tracks here following the same formula in an overly safe way, and you end up with a hard rock album that just feels like it’s riding the coattails of its peers.

I did like 7 of the tracks here, but I always kept noting that they just felt basic, whether lyrically or instrumentally. As a whole, I’m just not too crazee about this one. There’s really not much to say; if it clicks at a higher level, then good for you. For me, it just didn’t, as it never hit a higher gear in a way that stuck out. There’s no bad tracks, but I just don’t think it has anything very special going for it. Hence, a 3.

I’m at a 10.

I can’t even explain why, honestly. It just really fucking clicked for me. The Abbey Road medley taught me that I love when tracks flow into each other, even with seemingly no rhyme or reason. Todd Rundgren’s 26-minute medley to start “A Wizard, A True Star” taught me that manic shifts within that flow can be incredibly appealing if the musicality meets the moment. This album is comprised of 3 of those medleys / suites, each focusing on their own subjects: the industrialization / colonization of modern America, a very loose look at puberty & its effect on how one slowly loses their childhood after going through their first truly emotional experience, and an entire suite on the human condition as it relates to the 4 elements of earth, air, fire, & water. Brian Wilson did not invent Avatar: The Last Airbender, but don’t be surprised if anyone thought to use Good Vibrations in an Avatar AMV years later as a result of listening to this album.

While I understand exactly why this album conceptually crashed & burned in 1966/67 (it is unbelievably ambitious for that time, assuming the same general structure is intact here), I feel like I need to listen to the Smile Sessions just to see how much of it was able to be realized back then, as well as Smiley Smile just for the hell of it. Obviously, this 2004 version is not what Brian Wilson & friends would’ve made back then, but it’s something that was good enough to release in Brian’s eyes, which makes me think it’s worth calling a somewhat definitive version. There’s just a lovely flow to all of these suites, and the transitions in each one feel flawless. Thematically, while I don’t quite see the connections between all 3 suites, the musicality of it all overrides any minor nitpicks I could have about it. This is a 1960s album made with 2004 tech, giving a much greater range to the production & the clarity within. The horn work, the pulse to the percussion, the sense of drama on certain tracks (“Mrs. O’Leary’s Cow” as a shining example), and the multitude of instruments & vocal harmonies that layer this album all come together brilliantly. It is a miracle that it’s as cohesive as it is, but I guess that’s a testament to all that “genius” talk they were praising onto Brian back in the day.

I’m also glad it’s a quick album. Well, “quick” comparatively – 47 minutes is nothing to scoff at, but it flies by given the pace / entertainment factor of each track. There’s always something with appeal, whether it’s in the wordless vocals or the quirky slide whistles or a sense of hypnosis brought upon by… well, anything here, really. It never feels like there’s a missed beat or a wasted second, and having an album that knows its purpose while achieving it so efficiently is just extremely welcomed, given the amount of directionless ones we’ve had recently. There are shorter tracks here, and there might be a track or two in the middle suite that sort of stalls vocally, but none of that ever felt like a bad thing to me. “Good Vibrations” as the peppy closing finale it was intended to be just feels right.

Ultimately, I really liked it. I think it’s futile to try and cover all the tracks here, as this is an album you’re just meant to feel out & follow its flow. If you can ride Brian Wilson’s wavelength, you’ll really, really enjoy this. If you can’t, you’ll still probably like a few tracks here. If you hate everything & you give this a 1, I’m going to assume you were born without any sense of joy or whimsy. For me, it’s a 10. It’s just a great album, and I was delighted by the entire thing. Thank goodness this was on the list. Rest in peace, Brian.

I’m at a 5. Maybe just a little higher.

Every now & then, a mirror can feel cathartic. The ability to look at a version of you that’s survived the worst & come out stronger is such a mental relief. I think this album is comprised of 11 tracks that are trying to be those cathartic mirrors – slightly exaggerated expressions of pressure, anxiety, stress & loneliness, meant to make certain listeners feel seen. If nothing else, I feel a little more seen, & in that sense, I think this album really worked for me. Instrumentally, I love the way it’s mixed; the very small wall of sound that gives the percussion a little more punch is done well, yet the vocals always being in the forefront of both that wall of sound & the percussion gives the album a little more intimacy that enhances the songwriting here.

Like I said, it’s a little exaggerated (“Conversation 16” being the most ‘exaggerated’ example in terms of overthinking & its effect on a relationship), but taking these situations to logical semi-extremes enhances that mirroring effect a bit more. These are written in ways that can be easily visualized, for the most part, and even when the visualizations aren’t there, the instrumental tone of each track fills in those gaps. One might argue that these tracks settle into themselves at a certain point, & while that is generally true, I think the lack of a bigger release helps a lot of these tracks digest better. “Runaway” is an example of this; being forced to sit in the atmosphere of an impending struggle in that relationship without actively experiencing it makes the tension feel that much more palpable & lived in. It’s easy to think about what might come next, and thus, how to try to avoid the same scenario in your own life, or worse, relive what comes next. I never said a cathartic mirror was easy to look at.

Matt Berninger’s vocals are fascinating to me; there’s not much of a natural lift to his voice & with a slight filtering / harmonization behind it, it gives it a neutral feel that definitely seems hit or miss to people. For my tastes, I think it really worked. There’s not a natural lift in terms of pitch, but there is a lift in terms of his cadence / emphasis. I think he knows exactly when to hit that lift & give some of the lines that are meant to hit harder their maximum effect. Obviously, that’s true of any competent singer, but what fascinates me about Matt Berninger is his ability to do it with more of a monotone / bassy baritone voice. There were a handful of times on this album where he went as low as that one guy from “69 Love Songs”, but I can’t remember that album having the same sense of presence on any of its tracks. Matt just feels imposing yet calm, and his narrative style works hand-in-hand with a lot of these tracks. It doesn’t work for everyone, but it really worked for me.

Overall, I think it’s just a great 11 tracks, and while I understand some of the complaints here (drab/dreary tones, “artificial” conflict, etc), it just feels like those people were unable to get that sense of catharsis out of this. It’s one that either clicks or it doesn’t, and while I won’t disparage anyone if it doesn’t, I think hitting it with a 1 or 2 for that reason reflects an anger that the list just isn’t catering to their own taste. The floor here should be a 3, and the ceiling could be as high as a 10 for anyone that relates to ALL of these tracks. I’m a little higher than a 5. Make of that what you will. I’m very glad this was on the list, and I might need to seek out more of The National.

I’m at a 3.5 that I’ll bump down to a 3.

I’ll try to keep this one short, because I don’t want to come across too negatively to an album that I ultimately liked, but… damn, I just could not latch onto a single track here from a lyrical standpoint, save for “Green Fields”, if only because the imagery was that apparent. The rest of these tracks are all very Britishly written, and while I’m not opposed to Damon Albarn’s use of the language to make broad societal complaints, I am a little bit opposed to making them as broad as they are. I can capture the air of each critique & I think the instrumental atmosphere enhances that air in a way that ultimately gives each track enough substance to work. However, without being able to contextualize them in a way that gives the album a bigger purpose past loose bitching & moaning about the ‘state of the world’, no matter how warranted it may be, it just never gives the album enough of an overall form.

The substance is there, but it’s not shaped into something concrete enough to flow together as a cohesive album. These are enjoyable tracks, yes, but they’re not memorable once you move past them, in part because of rather similar soundscapes / vocal tones on a lot of the tracks, & in part because of the lyricism here; however inventive & evocative it usually tries to be, it’s usually just a little too flowery for its own good. It’s an album with a lot to say & not enough of a concise structure in how it says it, leading to an overall disconnect that leaves the listener out of Damon Albarn & friends’ loop. Damon knows what these all mean. It’s hard for the listener to grasp, and that disconnect is just biting at me in a way that goes against my tastes.

I know I’m complaining, but I did enjoy this album. I might’ve just caught it on a more distracted day for me, and maybe on any future relistens, it’ll click a little better across the board. For now, I just can’t shake the non-cohesive vibe, and I’m not one to reward an album on “great atmosphere but with no clue what they mean” unless the atmosphere is that unbelievably strong. It is strong, but it’s not THAT strong. Hence, a 3.5 bumped down to a 3, but I’m glad it’s on the list.

I’m at a 10.

It’s not quite as “dazzling” as “Electric Ladyland” or “Are You Experienced” from an instrumental standpoint, but still mesmerizingly strong. I suspect the reason this has a 3.77 on the site as opposed to the other Hendrix albums is the lack of utterly mental guitar solos that feel lightyears ahead, or at least, not as many of them as one would hope for. Sure, I’d hope for them too, but this album makes up for it by balancing out the instrumentation more equally & giving just a little bit more attention to the lyrics / vocals. This album is meant to evoke a dreamier atmosphere, hence all of the ‘floating’ imagery & the vivid descriptions that are made to capture love in its most potent form. It’s less about the actions that get you there (though Jimi does seem almost as horny as Prince on a few tracks), but more about the feelings you experience. An axis is the line that everything centers around, & this album is Jimi’s attempt to capture that exact center, including its highest highs & the woeful lows that can emerge from ever feeling love to begin with. Even a track like “If 6 Was 9” qualifies as one affected by love; if the world were to ever turn upside-down on its head, Jimi’s going to stay the same, and you’ll have to accept him for exactly who he is. It’s love that’s meant to reflect from the listener back to him, and one YOU’LL be forced to accept even as the times possibly change around him.

I have very few nitpicks here; maybe some slight overuse of the panning trick production-wise (though I’ll easily forgive it for 1967) & maybe just a little unbalanced in terms of the actual flow of the album from track to track (“You Got Me Floatin’” feels a little odd between “If 6 Was 9” & “Castles Made of Sand”, theming-wise), but all in all, it’s just a tight as hell 40 minutes that doesn’t waste a single second. Yes, it is the least technically impressive of the 3 albums Jimi Hendrix has here, but I think showcasing that versatility is important to understanding the scope of Jimi’s overall work. The only Hendrix track I knew going into this entire 1001 Albums thing was “Voodoo Child (Slight Return)”, so between all 40-ish tracks between the 3 albums here, I’m just blown away by the impact he made in such a short time. As far as this goes, it’s just a great blend of relaxed songwriting, eclectic instrumentation peppered with pulsing percussion, & Hendrix’s more atmospheric guitar work to create an album that does loosely feel like an axis of love. It’s a 10.

Jimi Hendrix should be 83 years old right now. It’s a shame he didn’t give us more, but damn, I LOVE what he was able to give.

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

I mean, I hear why they’re the part of the “big 4” of thrash metal after listening to this. From top to bottom, it’s pretty damn good, & you can’t ever say there’s no energy on this. It’s well-written, even with a number of tracks taken from pop culture references & retelling Stephen King plots, and the constant tempo shifting gives it a good sense of progression in each track that stops the album from hitting any intensely stale points.

Unfortunately, there is a staleness that eventually washes over the album, mostly in its latter half. At 50 minutes long, it’s just a little much for how little variance there is from track to track. I’m personally not complaining about the soundscape here, since their technical efficiency is off the charts, but I'd be remiss to act like every track here isn’t just a manic drum beat with tempo shifts placed throughout from an instrumental standpoint. Obviously, it’s more than that, but that general blueprint is the standard for most of the 50 minutes here, and at a certain point, it just gets to feel a little much. Part of that comes with a slight dichotomy between some of the lyrics & the instrumentation behind it – Metallica knows when to switch up their style based on what the song is about. Anthrax seemingly does not; a track like “Efilnikufesin” feels like the biggest example here, with the sincere lyrics about how drug abuse has wrecked so many shining stars full of potential… being met with a similar soundscape to the other 45 minutes. It’s a constant pulse that gives the actual intent of the track no room to shine or breathe, and that slight disconnect is this album’s biggest issue.

Ultimately, it just doesn’t flow as cleanly as its peers do, and while it’s not enough of an issue to make me consider bumping this down to a 4, it does feel like something that should’ve been solved by 1987, given that “Master of Puppets” was a year earlier & they spent the entire time before recording this album touring with Metallica. None of that rubbed off on them? I guess it just might not be Anthrax’s style, but still. Regardless, I think it’s a pretty good album with no real skips behind it (although skipping WITHIN tracks to get past some of the longer intros feels fair), and while I might go down on any future listens if it just doesn’t click the same way, I’m impressed enough by the full package here to go from a 4.5 up to a 5 on a first pass. I think it’s worth being on the list.

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

This is the closest thing we’ll get to a Mary J. Blige album on the list, and for that, I’m not complaining. Ms. Dynamite’s vocal range channels just about everyone in the hip-hop / R&B space at the time, going as nasally as Amy Winehouse at some point, as deep as Mary J. Blige at others, and sometimes channeling Ashanti & Whitney Houston’s more aged vocals of this era. The early 2000s might’ve been a bit crowded in terms of this general style, but it’s just interesting to hear it comes from the other side of the pond & done as successfully as it’s done here. I genuinely don’t think there’s a bad track here at all, and from going through the original UK version (that means cutting out “Danger” & “Ramp” while listening on Spotify), it’s a pretty breezy hour with a solid enough variety to never get TOO stale.

It does, however, get a little stale, and that’s the main reason I’m bumping this down to a 4 as opposed to going up to a 5. There’s a lot of little reasons peppered into that, all of which aren’t super bothersome on their own, but as something that piles up throughout the album, just gets too big to ignore. The most obvious one comes in the outros – a lot of these tracks stagnate for the last minute or so, ending on the chorus repeating a couple of times while the instrumental (which has run its course) just kinda goes on in a way that becomes easy to tune out. This could’ve easily been fixed if the tracks cut out a bit sooner, or if the instrumentals just had some extra progression upon reaching the outros.

The instrumentals, however, are the second most obvious one: they just don’t quite hit a consistent vibrancy throughout. They’re all good, don’t get me wrong, & many of them are great, but too many of them settle too early, occasionally feeling a lot emptier on some tracks. This becomes a lot more apparent in the back half of the album, especially on stuff like “Sick ‘n’ Tired” or “All I Ever”. A lot of R&B / pop artists at this time would typically keep lifting a track up more & more, layering it with vocal runs & extra backing melodies to give it some extra pep, but the production work here just doesn’t really do that. It’s there, but it doesn’t do it to enough of a degree to give it the lift it needs. When the instrumentals REALLY hit (see: “It Takes More”), it fucking rocks, but it doesn’t hit like that as often as I wish it did.

The third thing is just in a bit of topic reuse; her songwriting is lovely & vivid, able to capture the pain of her harder relationships while being able to capture the love she has for her family. It’s a decently biographical album, and I think her vocals portray that reflection well. There’s some intimacy here that enhances a lot of the tracks. It also makes it stick out when she’s reusing some topics, leading to a slight bloat that doesn’t make the album flow as cleanly as it can. I love her talking so confidently about her self-worth, but when there’s a lot of tracks preaching about that self-worth that don’t approach the topic in a more unique way, it just doesn’t hit as hard on the subsequent tracks.

I know I devoted 3 paragraphs to the reason I’m docking this half a percentage point, but I’m just an over-explainer, really. There’s lots to like about this album in particular; the versatility in her flow, the songwriting, & some of the cooler production work. Again, it doesn’t elevate in a way that I’d prefer, but that’s just my tastes talking. Ultimately, I think this album holds up well; sure, it’s not doing anything so overly innovative in a way that might tick some people’s boxes for an album you HAVE to hear before you die, but it’s just consistently good to great. Yes, you’ll get the same general musical diet if you listen to Lauryn Hill, Amy Winehouse, or Missy Elliott, but you can’t tell me that “similar musical diet” isn’t present for other sets of bands / artists on a lot of this list overall. It’s called genres, people. As it stands, it’s a catchy hour that had my head bumping to the beat & my brain impressed by some lines / flows, and that’s all I can ask for from an R&B album of the era. Hence, a 4.5 that I’ll bump down to a 4, though it could get up to a 5 someday.

I’m at a 3.5 that I’ll bump down to a 3, though I think I’d prefer to stay at a 3.5.

I’m not as familiar with Pharrell’s N.E.R.D. era, so I was certainly taken off guard by the eclectic mix of nu-metal, Lenny Kravitz-style rock R&B, with just a touch of Uncle Kracker in there for some reason. It’s a very, very 2000s album, and while I do like a number of the tracks here, I just can’t help but feel like the entire thing never figures out exactly what it wants to be as a result of all the genre mixing. It’s mistakably Pharrell (as opposed to unmistakably), as he eschews a lot of his usual tropes of this era to put out something that just feels inconsistently consistent. There’s really not a bad track here (though there are some flat ones), but it’s just so far outside of his usual bag, leading to a lot of swings that generally connect, but never really make a harder impact like he intends. If the goal was to hit home runs, Pharrell is only hitting doubles or singles, and not in the “She Wants to Move” way.

I think the disconnect of this album’s modus operandi is best exhibited by “Wonderful Place / Waiting for You” & “Drill Sergeant / Preservation” as back to back double features. The former two have a disconnect in their own way, with “Wonderful Place” being an almost Stevie Wonder-esque delight caused from getting high as a kite, before following it up with a track where a woman almost loses her drowning daughter (or in a very dark interpretation, they BOTH drown & go to Heaven). There’s a sense of peace with “Wonderful Place” followed by a rather weird scenario that doesn’t really feel as comforting / reassuring as Pharrell wants it to.

Going from the generally light instrumentation there to the harder tones of “Drill Sergeant / Preservation” would normally make for a good dichotomy, but here, it just feels inauthentic. “Drill Sergeant” is the anti-war track everyone made in 2004, but if you were to give me that track by itself without telling me who was singing it, I’d never guess Pharrell Williams in a million years. It just doesn’t fit his style, and while I do like that, it’s just a bit odd. “Preservation” is him framing the struggle of avoiding the pitfalls of fame & presenting himself as still just a guy on the streets as something akin to a battlefield, which totally disconnects from the entire point of “Drill Sergeant”. I understand the war thematics back to back, but doing a “I’m just like you!” track in a way that no normal person would relate to feels a bit silly. As a 4-track suite, there’s just no connective tissue here, at least in a way that feels like it naturally flows.

That lack of connective tissue weaves its way through a lot of this album, and while I think it makes for a solid 15-track run, it just doesn’t make for a good album experience. Pharrell’s production work here is pretty good, but without the natural flow of an album, it just feels weaker by his usual standards. I know Pharrell has good stuff, but it’s just not showcased here to its fullest. Don’t even get me started on how weird “Don’t Worry About It” feels as an opener; the possessive part of it isn’t even that bad, but the extremely cheesy Kid Rock-adjacent “she’s badass” part just feels weird coming out of Pharrell. Hence, a 3.5 bumped down to a 3. I really can’t see a reason to go up to a 4 or higher, but if someone wants to, I won’t blame them. I guess it just didn’t fully click for me, or at the very least, it doesn’t stick in a memorable way outside of a few tracks. I might need to go listen to “In Search Of…” on my own, just to see if that one would’ve been better on the list.

I’m pleasantly surprised to be at a 5.

I gave “Psychocandy” a 3, which boiled down to 3 specific reasons. First, the wall of sound that was so prevalent there didn’t really add anything meaningful to the tracks or the enjoyment of those tracks. Secondly, the drums & vocals felt like they had no real presence or emotion, at least not to the degree I would’ve expected. Finally, the track order never found a natural progression, which led to a disconnected album experience. All of those reasons felt valid for “Psychocandy”, and I was hoping they’d fix these when this album popped up as today’s pick.

They fixed them, alright. This is a much better album than Psychocandy, on account of all of those issues being fixed, & blending them with strong songwriting. The lyricism here is able to channel the melancholy mood established at the top of the album with “Darklands” on most of its tracks. It occasionally feels like a sort of shoegaze-y Springsteen, which is a big bit of praise in my book. It is pretty dark overall, but I’d say the focus on love tracks, some occasional grace in the lyrics, & a generally ‘peppy’ instrumental lean keeps the album from feeling too drab. My favorite one here is probably “April Skies”, just because I’m struck by the struggle between acknowledging an unhealthy love & the desire to maintain it. A lot of tracks in this genre just accept the unhealthy love & play around it, so to have a track treat it like the sort of ‘addiction’ it is & quitting it is a welcome change of pace.

Ultimately, I just enjoyed everything here. It’s a consistently strong album, and while it might be a little one-note in its darker / depressed tones for some people, I think the album does a good job of making its modus operandi clear from the get-go, so I never minded it. The biggest knock I have against this album is some of the outros on its earliest tracks – it settles HARD into a “repeat one line a lot” structure, but it thankfully shakes that off after “Nine Million Rainy Days”. The biggest nitpick I have here is that the wall of sound on “Fall” is just a little overtuned; it would’ve been better if it naturally reached that peak by the end of the track. Regardless, I don’t think there’s a bad track here, and if my nitpicks / complaints boil down to personal taste, it’s probably a pretty good album. The higher rating on the site says as much. Hence, a 5, & I’m glad it's on the list.