Reviews by heavymetal

Classic country sound, which is not my preferred genre, but I do love a twangy Telecaster. I enjoyed this, but not quite enough to return to it ever.

Ok, I gave this one a few listens. The first couple listens didn’t do much for me. It seemed like a perfectly good indie rock record with technically great playing and songwriting, but something just wasn’t clicking. However, I could tell there was something there and there wasn’t anything I disliked about it, so I threw it on a couple more times throughout the day and by the end of the day I was really quite enjoying it. It’s full of dense and complicated arrangements that still somehow come across very dreamy and chill. You can tell a lot of time went into the production of this album.

This is yet another incredibly influential and incredibly divisive albums that's full of droning, dissonant and atonal noise, and feedback. It won't be for everyone, but I absolutely love it! I'm Waiting for the Man, Venus in Furs, Heroine and the Black Angel's Death Song are huge highlights for me. Heroine is honestly a perfectly crafted song.

I saw Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds on their recent tour and they played a staggering version of Tupelo describing Elvis' birth into a Biblical storm in Tupelo, Mississippi. Prior to the performance, Nick Cave spoke about how much Elvis inspired him. I kind of found this surprising because I didn't see a lot of parallels between their music, but I honestly wasn't familiar enough with Elvis to really make an informed opinion.

Listening to From Elvis In Memphis now, I actually do see some similarities in their singing styles and some of the gospel aspects of the tracks although Nick has definitely twisted this sound into a much more menacing sound. I dug into it a bit further and according to the Red Hand Files this was Nick's favourite era of Elvis' music, and he even mentions a few tracks off this albums as his favourites, so it's starting to make a lot of sense.

Anyways, while I really enjoy digging into my favourite bands influences, I also enjoyed listening to From Elvis in Memphis a lot more than I was expecting. Not that I was expecting to dislike it, but I was expecting a much more dated rock-and-roll sound and for some reason I have an impression that Elvis is a bit corny and gimmicky. However, the production on this album is actually pretty amazing and it felt surprisingly timeless. I thoroughly enjoyed listening to this album.

Oh hell yes! I always have some time for more Funkadelic in my life!

I've never heard of the Dictators before, but I had a great time with this album! It's simple, fun, sarcastic early punk music that really doesn't take itself too seriously. I love the cover of I Got You Babe.

I also hadn't heard the term protopunk before starting this project, but I'm finding I really enjoy every band with that label. I'm excited to get more early protopunk albums I've never heard, and I'm sure there's tons of it!

I think everyone knows what they're in for when they get a Janis Joplin album; just solid, gritty, blues rock with an iconic voice! While I can understand that her voice might not be for everyone, I personally love it. That said, this still isn't really an album that I can see myself throwing on all the time, but I did thoroughly enjoy listening to it.

After receiving 2 R.E.M. albums from the list (Murmur and Automatic for the People) and one outside the list (my in-laws gave me their vinyl collection, including a copy of Green), I think R.E.M. have finally clicked for me. I really enjoyed this album and might have to go back and have another listen to Murmur and Automatic for the People now.

That said, I still can’t get past how much Michael Stipe sounds like Gord Downie and every time I listen to R.E.M. it makes me want to throw on some Tragically Hip instead.

I’ve never been much of a country fan, but I ended up enjoying this one way more than I was expecting. It was a pretty good listen. I actually did know Metal Firecracker through the Tallest Man on Earth’s cover album, Too Late for Edelweiss. Still fairly unlikely that I’ll seek this out on my own in the future though

Generally, I am not a fan of electronica or mainstream pop music because it can be so bland and repetitive, but this is definitely not that! This is the kind of album that I immediately started playing a second time after it was finished because I felt like I had more to discover. She has such an iconic and unique voice and I appreciate mixing various genres and instruments with electronic music.

I'm genuinely confused as to why Prince is so well regarded because I'm not a fan of this. I guess it was a Sign 'O' the Times...

Seriously though, I was about to dismiss this album as entirely forgettable until we got to I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man, the Cross, and It’s Going to Be a Beautiful Night. The latter of which was my favourite track on the album and stood out well above the rest.

I’ve spent embarrassingly little time with Black Sabbath in the past. I’ve known the big hits, but not much beyond that. I figured today would be a good day to rectify this oversight of my musical knowledge and I spent the day not only listening to Vol 4, but also their self-titled debut, Paranoid, Master of Reality, and Sabbath Bloody Sabbath.

Their self-titled album was by far my favourite. It’s not only the debut of Black Sabbath, but of heavy metal itself. The Wizard alone deserves a 5/5.

Paranoid and Vol 4 were probably my next favourites. I actually knew most of the songs on Paranoid, but only really knew Changes on Vol 4. Changes is also one of my all time favourite songs. Thoroughly enjoyed both of these and will return to them the next time I want some good hard rock. I’ll give these both 4/5.

Master of Reality and Sabbath Bloody Sabbath were probably my least favourite of the bunch. They were still good, but almost felt too polished compared to the earlier albums. I did enjoy the acoustic tracks on Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. Maybe I was just getting a bit burnt out on Black Sabbath after listening to them all day, but I’d give these two 3/5.

This is just an all around solid psychedelic folk record full of great harmonies and interesting sonic experiments that never felt out of place. Thoroughly enjoyed listening to this one, but probably not going to return to it ever.

I’ve always understood Prince was one of those revolutionary pop artists that everyone is supposed to enjoy, but I did not enjoy the first few tracks at all.

1999 was just awful 80s pop garbage, Little Red Corvette was slightly better but it was still pretty awful, and Delirious was at least a minute too long and that synth line is grating. I was gearing up for a long, tough listen, but I did end up enjoying the middle section even if the tracks were still surprisingly long. A lot more fun, funky tracks like Lady Cab Driver and All the Critics Love U in New York and some absolutely wild and experimental tracks like Something in the Water (Does Not Compute). Let's Pretend We're Married and DMSR are probably the horniest songs I've heard; the last few verses of Let's Pretend We're Married in particular are pretty wild. Unfortunately, the album ends on another sour note with International Lover that is more awful 80s pop garbage.

I gave the album a second listen to make sure I wasn't missing something, but other than a few tracks in the middle, I'd prefer to never listen to this again.

I’ve always known Amy Winehouse was a great singer who died tragically, but I’ve never listened to her music before. I really enjoyed the jazz and soul spirit of the album and her singing was pretty good, but I found some of the lyrical content to be quite shallow. Overall, it was a good album and I can see myself returning to a few of the songs, but I probably won’t be returning to the entire album again.

We were visiting with my grandma one day and she mentioned that some guy had hired them to bring a car out to Omemee. He was going to drive the car to Massey Hall to play an show and they would bring the car back home again. This was mentioned incredibly casually, but my dad was immediately asking, “I’m sorry, who is this guy? Is his name Neil Young?” And, again, as casual as a grandma can state, “oh yes, that’s his name”.

So yeah, my grandma has a picture of her, her partner, and Neil Young on the mantle along with the pictures of all her grandchildren. Turns out he was a very nice man and had some concerns with how the engine was running.

Anyways, I’ve been on a huge Neil Young binge lately and this one is in the running for my favourite album of his, so this is a pretty easy 5/5.

A masterclass in songwriting in a surprisingly short album. Scarborough Fair / Canticle is an obvious classic, but I really enjoyed Patterns and the Bright Green Pleasure Machine. Also as a major fan of Bob Dylan, I loved A Simple Desultory Philippic (or How I Was Robert McNamara’d Into Submission). My only complaint is that some of softer, dreamier songs are just a bit too soft and sweet for me and they somehow start sounding like parodies of Simon & Garfunkel.

Reading up on the history of rai music has been incredibly interesting, but I’m genuinely curious if this is the best example of rai music out there? The samples and drums sound like bog standard stock sounds out of a shitty Casio keyboard. I’d be much more interested in hearing some earlier rai music rather than this more modern pop rai sound.

If there was one genre of music I couldn’t stand while growing up, it was 80s pop music. Close second would be country music. While I was open to weird experimental music, I was incredibly closed minded to anything I perceived as being commercial and 80s pop seemed to be the epitome of commercial music in my mind. I definitely missed out on a lot of music because of that. This album in particular probably isn’t something I’d return to frequently, but it’s pretty enjoyable, if somewhat straight forward pop with a bit of a bluesy and country flair.

The album starts strong with possibly one of the best songs ever recorded and also the only Verve song I know (or so I thought). Why have I never dug more into the Verve considering I actually really like Bittersweet Symphony?

Unfortunately, it’s kind of a step down in quality after Bittersweet Symphony. Nothing really stood out to me and a lot of the tracks just sounds like generic and derivative britpop (I genuinely thought Lucky Man was an Oasis song; the second Verve song I apparently knew). The tracks that did stand out just got annoying. For instance, Catching the Butterfly sounds interesting, but then he just keeps saying the same line about catching a butterfly in lucid dreams over and over for 7 minutes.

All that being said, this isn’t actually a bad album. It was enjoyable to listen to, it just didn’t live up to the expectations set by the first song and it ends up sounding like every other britpop album on the list.