Reviews by heavymetal

I could never get into Marilyn Manson. He always felt like a cheap copy of Nine Inch Nails who was trying to be as shocking and controversial as possible. It doesn’t help to find out it’s more than just performative and he actually is a creep in real life.

The music here is actually a lot better than I was giving him credit for. It does sound a lot like Nine Inch Nails at times, but Trent Reznor’s fingerprints are all over this album. There were a few standout tracks, the Beautiful People in particular is an excellent song. I still think I’d rather just listen to Nine Inch Nails than return to this album though.

Today I am building an IKEA Hemnes daybed for my toddler who is getting too big for a crib and I have the pleasure of listening to this album on repeat while I work. It’s been a good day.

I never realized I was a fan of Steely Dan prior to this project. The only two Steely Dan songs I knew coming into this were Do It Again and Reelin' in the Years, both great songs that are on this album, but they barely scratch the surface of where Steely Dan would take their music. This album is a lot more rock oriented compared to some of their later jazz fusion, but there are still some jazzy references on this album. Overall, this album doesn't quite hit the same heights as the others on the list (especially not Aja), but it's still damned good.

It's weird hearing Where Is My Mind in the middle of this album. It's a song that I've heard hundreds of times, but I don't think I've actually listened to it in context of the rest of the album. It's maybe a little stripped back compared to the songs that lead up to it with simple drums and bass, an acoustic guitar, and that signature distorted electric guitar melody, but it's still fits really well with the rest of the noisy, experimental, and punk adjacent songs on here. This album is definitely in contention for my favourite Pixies album

My math teacher in high school was obsessed with the Clash. On every test there would be a bonus question about the Clash, usually something as simple as “name 3 songs by the Clash” or “name the guitar player in the Clash”. It was always nice to get some easy marks.

Anyways, I’ve got nothing in particular to add about London Calling. It’s a fantastic album that I still listen to from time to time. Sure, it doesn’t sound how most people expect punk to sound because they incorporate many other genres like ska, dub, and funk in their sound, but everyone is way too uptight with labels in music. The “real punks” are just as bad as the “real metalheads”.

Dear God is easily the best track on this album and it's wild that, while it was originally intended to be in the track list, it was pulled partially due to fears of repercussions from American audiences. Only to have it explode in popularity in the US through college radio play leading to a recall and repressing with the song added back in.

Other than Dear God, there were a few other stand out tracks for me, like 1000 Umbrellas, Big Day, and Mermaid Smiled, but I was mostly indifferent to the rest of it. 1000 Umbrellas and Big Day in particular felt like they were paying homage to specific Beatles sounds.

In general I'm not a fan of modern pop, but I do have a bit of a soft spot for Taylor Swift's newer, pop oriented albums for two main reasons. The first is my wife who is a huge fan of her music, so I have heard all of these songs countless times. The second is her collabs with the National's Bryce Dessner on Folklore and Evermore, which are easily her best albums in my book. I was a massive National fan in the past, so Folklore dropping in 2020 was a surprising melding of my music with my wife's and it worked really, really well. I don't like 1989 nearly as much as I do Folklore, but it's still a very well produced, well written, and catchy pop album.

The first few tracks on this album have a strong focus on textures, sounds, and atmosphere, which I did really like, but the novelty quickly wore off and I found myself getting bored about half way through the second track.

There’s a bit of a stylistic shift at the song Wilmot. The tracks have less of the bubbly textures and take on a bit of a dub and rock feel, which I initially enjoyed, but the novelty once again quickly wore off by the repetitive nature of the tracks. That’s my main gripe about this album and about electronica in general; everything is too long and too repetitive. There were elements I liked, but more often than not, I started eyeing up the skip button before the end of a track.

I came into this project knowing that hip-hop was hit or miss for me. Through this project, I’ve learned that the misses are almost always gangsta rap, so I was pleasantly surprised listening to 2PAC this morning. This has the west coast flow, which I like, but 2PAC feels like he has something to say rather than sticking with the standard gangsta rap cliches. There are quite a few songs that feel introspective, but that said, he doesn’t fully avoid gangsta rap cliches, and it’s a bit hard to take songs like Me Against the World, It Ain’t Easy, and Fuck the World seriously when he was clearly associated with a lot of violence in his life.

Now this is the kind of electronic music I am into. Atmospheric, ambient, experimental, hypnotic, and slowly evolving. The synths all have an analog warmth and the sequencers and delays are incredibly well composed. This is the kind of album that I had to stop everything I was doing to just sit, listen, and fully absorb it.

I kind of hate when the only album available on streaming is a deluxe edition with dozens of bonus tracks, live tracks, outtakes, and demos. I like experiencing an album as it was originally intended to be heard when it was released, so I considered only listening to the 6 songs that make up the original Superfuzz Bigmuff album, but took a chance and just pressed play on disc 1 of the deluxe edition. I am happy I did because I loved this from the first notes of Touch Me I'm Sick. This is just amazing, noisy punk / early grunge. It's right up my alley. Also, the Superfuzz and the Big Muff are both excellent pedals!

Honestly, I can't believe I've never listened to Mudhoney before. I went through a huge Nirvana phase in high school, but I never really dove any deeper into the Seattle scene or any of their other contemporaries. Mainly because I was a close minded teen with way too many preconceived notions about what an authentic band was, but also probably because of how I was able to consume music as a teen in the early 2000s. There was no streaming, I wasn't aware of any college radio stations available in my area, MTV was mostly playing music I didn't care for and started their descent into reality TV, and downloading / piracy was very limited due to an incredibly slow dial up connection. I did spend the majority of my limited teen budget on CDs at HMV, but I was mostly interested in 60s and 70s bands at the time.

This album starts off with a sound collage that's overwhelming and feels like circus music from a nightmare. At first I was taken aback and was preparing for a long, difficult listen, but the album really came together quite well and sounds like a mix of the most psychedelic and experimental Beatles tracks and the Velvet Underground. By the end I was completely entranced. I think there may be a few times that their ambitions surpassed their skills or the technical abilities at the time, but the best experimental and avant-garde music should be pushing boundaries. I am definitely going to have to give this a few more listens to fully digest everything I just heard.

On second listen, the opening track isn't nearly as abrasive or overwhelming. In context with the rest of the album, it actually works quite well and makes a lot of sense. I am really happy to have discovered this album and am going to return to it in the future for sure.

What a bold opening track. It seems that it was written specifically to offend as many people as possible. He's casually dropping the n-word constantly throughout the song, which you'd expect would be frowned on by anyone who isn't racist, but the song is also clearly mocking racists and bigots. Who exactly is this song for?

The whole album is very well written and Randy Newman is a phenomenal storyteller. Unfortunately, I just don't really care for his music. I don't dislike it, it just doesn't really do much for me and I don't think I'll ever return to this album.

I had never heard of these guys, but this was a great time! I’m generally a fan of folk rock and the traditional Scottish/Irish folk elements really worked well.

This is possibly the most 80s sounding album from the list yet, but I actually liked it quite a bit. I frequently find goth music too depressing and full of despair, but this managed to find a great, dark and moody, balance without being too much.

So it turns out I just might not like ELO all that much. There are some good moments throughout this album and Mr. Blue Sky is still a great song, but it honestly felt a bit overdone by the time I got to it. Overall, listening to over an hour of maximalist prog classic rock is exhausting.

I feel like this album opened pretty strong, but it quickly fell off the tracks for me. There were a few moments I really enjoyed like the end of Horsin' Around, but, other than a few highlights, I just didn't care for this album. That said, it's not bad. I feel like it was clearly well written and, while it definitely has an 80s sound, it's well produced. Overall, it's fine, it's just not for me.

If this project has taught me anything, it’s that I can’t stand electronic dance music. Especially when it’s from the 90s. While this one starts off with some interesting use of samples, it quickly devolves into the same tedious dance beats that I just don’t care for unless I am in a club and have consumed copious amounts of drugs. To top it all off, by pairing tedious, repetitive beats with long songs and a long album it makes this feel like it goes on for an eternity.

The sequencing on Lush 3-1 into Lush 3-2 is just plain bad; the former ends with an awkward fade out only for the exact same beat to suddenly start again in the latter. And apparently they do know how to sequence tracks well as I didn’t realize when Lush 3-2 transitioned into Impact.

There’s a 5-star review that admits Walk On is annoying, which I find baffling because Walk On sounds identical to the rest of the tracks on here with the exception of the deep, didgeridoo-esque drone (that I did like) and a metronome-esque ticking in the background (that was mixed well enough to not be annoying to me).

Well I made it to the end. Fuck that was tedious.

I was surprised at how heavy some of the songs on Queen II were, and I'm still surprised that some of this goes pretty hard, but Sheer Heart Attack is a lot more of the over the top, dramatic, and theatrical Queen sound that I expect from them, and I just don't really like it. I'm just not a fan of Queen. They have my full respect for what they were able to achieve, and Freddie Mercury is a phenomenal singer, but this just isn't for me.

This album feels so far ahead of its time. Some of these tracks are hypnotic and pleasant ambient electronica and others are noisy, experimental affairs that wouldn’t feel out of place on a Sonic Youth album. It’s two different ends of a spectrum and yet somehow they manage to weave the sounds together incredibly well.