Reviews by ikejiri

Shake Your Money Maker
I had a Best of the Black Crowes, and although I always liked it, it never made me want to delve into their discography. Perhaps because, even though I found them enjoyable, I wasn’t always totally convinced by their Stonesy-Aerosmithy-bluesy-southern rock-soul retroism.

However, listening now I didn’t have that same sentiment - it may not be the most innovative album, but then it doesn’t need to be. As with the album title they wear their influences very clearly and unapologetically, there isn’t really the need to be innovative or original, they just need to be proficient at this type of bluesy rock’n’roll and write catchy songs, which, for the most part they do very well. They definitely benefit from Chris Robinson’s voice. Although it may not be the most nuanced it’s almost perfectly suited to this style of southern-rock, and Rich Robinson is again a fantastically well suited guitarist for this genre, and together they definitely know how to write choruses. I know they toured with Oasis, and although the musical style is different, there are clear parallels with Noel in his ability to write incredibly catchy and melodic guitar lines and riffs.

The big songs I already was aware of; Twice as Hard, Jealous Again, She Talks to Angels, the cover of Hard to Handle remain excellent, but there are other great tracks too. Sister Luck builds from a nice country-blues intro full on rock song with some excellent organ swells. Could I’ve Been So Blind has one of those catchy choruses, and their melodic skill takes what could have been a rather underwhelmingly generic song and turns it into a fun little rocker. Thick’nThin’s energy and Boogie Woogie piano again take it from generic shuffle to a great bit of energetic fun. It does tail off a little after She Talks to Angels, but Struttin’ Blues, has some more excellent southern rock organ, and it finishes on the enjoyable spooky Exile on Main Street style Mercy, Sweet Moan.

Set against the prevalence of cock rock/heavy metal and the burgeoning grunge scene it’s harking back to early 70s rock’n’roll would have stood out, and it has aged very well - it may not be the most forward thinking album, but it’s elevated bar room blues rock is very enjoyable and without pretension. It’s on the cusp of 3 and 4, but I’ll just tip into a 4, as it’s something I will come back to when I’m in the mood from some unchallengingly enjoyable boogie rock.
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Playlist submission: Twice as Hard

Frampton Comes Alive!
I suppose live albums only really mean something if you were there, or if you really love a particular artist and know all their songs already. And as much as I like it when songs mutate and go somewhere else when played live, I would always reach for the studio versions of most songs. And apart from Show Me The Way and Baby I Love Your Way I’m not at all familiar with Frampton's catalogue, so in isolation it's tricky to connect with, especially as it’s very long.

However, it does make me want to have a listen to his studio albums, as many of the songs seem to be in that warm and golden 70s soft rock sweet spot that I tend to like, and I’d be really keen to hear the original studio versions. And the playing also is very good, some nice guitar sounds, from solos to crunchy chords, and the band is certainly very tight - I imagine the show itself would have been very cool, if you were there.

It’s tricky to score, if I was immersed in his back catalogue and really into him I imagine I'd have already heard this and would already love it, but as it stands it currently has marginal re-listenability for me, even though it's pleasant enough. It’s long too. But I’m intrigued enough by some of the songs and want to listen to more of him, so I’ll just tip it into a 3.
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Playlist submission: Show Me The Way

Moby Grape
Frustratingly there are only a handful of tracks on Tidal, I assume there are some rights issues, so it was another YT listen, which is always a bit unsatisfying.

But the album itself made up for it, mainly as I wasn’t expecting it to be such a breezy collection of country rock/folk rock songs with a bluesy psychedelic edge - I had expected it to be much more in line with the generic West Coast acid rock of other albums from 1967.

While it certainly has elements of that sound, the country and folk influences, a great melodic sense, the excellent bass playing, the superb pre-Eagles harmonies, the aversion to long drawn out jams and a lack of acid-philosophy posturing set it well apart from their psychedelic contemporaries, and feels, from 5,315 miles and 58 years distance to evoke the sunshiney Californian hippy scene of my mind far better than, say, Country Joe and the Fish.

Hey Grandma, Fall on You and Come in the Morning are the best of the rockier songs, the harmonies and Come in the Morning are particularly nice. Of the lower key tracks, 8.05 is a really lovely little folky tune, but Someday is the standout, a fantastic country-ish folk-ish track, with a lovely melancholic melody and feel

I suppose the closest touchstones would be The Byrds and The Grateful Dead. The pacier tempos, driving rhythms and bluesy rock’n’roll differentiate it from the grace of The Byrds, and it, to me at least, has a much better melodic and musical sensibility than the Grateful Dead

It’s on the cusp of 3 and 4, I think I’ll stick with a high 3 - I really enjoyed it, there are some excellent songs and I’m sure I’ll come back to it (even more so if it came fully onto Tidal), but I probably won’t seek it out all that often
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Playlist submission: Someday

Dance Mania
Papa loves Mambo!

Hard not to sway a little bit to the rhythms and exuberance of the songs and music. Like a lot of latin music I’m not really very familiar with the ins and outs of the varying genres and rhythmic styles. And it’s easy to associate it too closely with salsa classes and people from Buckinghamshire who make salsa dancing their entire personalities, but throwing that out the window and just concentrating on the music makes for a much more enjoyable experience.

Very glad to have listened, may not come back that often, but it’s an undeniably charming 40 odd minutes of the type of music I don’t normally listen to, so very happy to give a high 3.
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Playlist submission: Hong Kong Mambo

Live Through This
Outside Nirvana, I don’t find Grunge to be a particularly interesting genre and as this does sit squarely in that box, it ultimately has limited appeal for me.

However, Asking for It, Plump, Jennifer’s Body, Doll Parts, Credit in the Straight World and Rock Star are really good, and this is clearly a cut above most Grunge. Courtney Love’s vocals, direct, confrontational lyrics, pop nous and undoubted charisma and presence definitely set it apart, and when some of the garage-surf-pop influences come through it’s pretty enjoyable.

On first listen this was a 2, but on repeat listens those points of difference came through and I enjoyed it much more. Not sure how often I’d come back to it, but I think it has enough about it to push it to a solid if unspectacular 3
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Playlist submission: Credit in the Straight World

Loveless
Isn’t Anything had some nice moments and some good songs, but nothing as great as Only Shallow, When You Sleep, I Only Said, Come In Alone, Sometimes or Soon, all fantastic noise-shoegaze-rock, with great hooks, rhythms and fuzzy atmospheres. This definitely feels like a tightening up and improvement on the Isn’t Anything template, and for all its loose wooziness its an extremely tightly constructed record. It’s densely layered but also to the point and direct, and the overdriven fug has much less of the wooliness or meandering noise of Isn’t Anything.

Not all the songs quite reach the heights of those songs, the run of Loomer, Touched and To Here Knows When in particular miss some of the queasy magic and pop hooks of the songs above, but they do contribute to the overall hypnagogic atmosphere, alternatively adding some sharp edges and further dreamlike tones to the overall feel of the album.

A great album with moments of beauty and hypnotic grace, as well as some pleasingly abrasive textures, another one of those albums that you can let wash over you, or you can concentrate on and pick out particular sounds and movements. It’s probably the best of this type of art-shoegaze-drone-noise rock, making it an easy 4.
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Playlist submission: I Only Said

The Predator
‘There’s a new girl on my street, and Imma introduce her to my meat’

Before listening I wasn’t sure I was up for another Ice Cube album, even if it has It Was A Good Day on it, after not particularly enjoying AmeriKKKa’s Most Wanted. But I actually liked it, sonically I much preferred it to that album and while it does suffer from some of the same issues - the relentless rapping about sex and mention of bitches and hos - it has much better grooves and samples. Don’t Trust ‘Em is a good example of those two things, fantastic beat and groove, musically brilliant but an egregious number of bitches.

When it’s more pointedly socially engaged like on When Will They Shoot?, The Predator, Who Got The Camera? or Integration, it’s excellent, the hooks and beats underscoring the words and samples, and it's notable how the things he raps about - racism, violence, police brutality etc - are still depressingly relevant. And when it refrains (for the most part) from racism and/or misogyny you get the truly excellent It Was a Good Day, a superb West coast sound with a kind of sad lyric - a good day is when someone you know doesn’t get shot.

I really like the production (shout out DJ Pooh!), the samples and beats are excellent throughout, there are some very good songs; When Will They Shoot, Wicked, The Predator, It Was a Good Day, Check Yo Self and Who Got the Camera, but there’s so much aimless misogyny. On balance, the good just about outweighs the bad, and I would listen again so I think it sits right in the 3s.
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Playlist submission: It Was a Good Day

Melody AM
Haven’t listened to this in years, but listened a lot when it came out and when it was very zeitgeisty.

Blue on Blue plus a great bass line equals the excellent So Easy, and Eple is fantastic. I’m not sure anything else quite reaches the heights of those, but there are some great euro-disco-Daft Punk-Air-funk-electro pop atmospherics throughout, and a couple of very good tracks; the downtempo Sparks, the disco-dance of Poor Leno, the dramatic Royksopp’s Night Out and
the arresting 40 Years, with what I think must be the bass from Jump into the Fire by Harry Nilsson slowed down? In between those the songs are fine, if not totally memorable.

Overall it’s a fine album with some very good tracks and some nice moments, but as a whole it never quite catches fire, neither quite hitting the Gallic charm and flair of Air or Daft Punk or the broodiness and immersive atmosphere of BoC, Bonobo, or Portishead. I would probably listen again, but likely in another 10 or 15 years, so I think it lands as a 3.
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Playlist submission: Eple

The Boatman’s Call
‘This useless fucker with his twinkling cunt’

I remember loving Into My Arms when it came out, I think I bought the single, and it takes me right back to A-level mocks in Jan ‘97.

I don’t think I heard the full album until much later, when I was a bit older and more open to Nick Cave. I love the piano based romantic solemnity and many if not all of the songs are brilliant; Into My Arms, the organ shuffle of Lime Tree Arbor, the atmospheric brilliance of Brompton Oratory, the lovelorn There is a Kingdom, Where Do We Go Now?, West Country Girl and the superb Idiot Prayer.

The only issue is that the relentless mournfulness of all these songs together can become a bit much, especially towards the end of the 2nd half. Taken in isolation they are great, but as collection it does tend to a feel of heaviness and unmoving stolidness.

Still it is a very fine album of anguished romantic piano balladry with some truly brilliant songs, but the unrelenting nature of the songs probably does make it a 4 rather than a 5.
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Playlist submission: Into My Arms

Bringing it all Back Home
In Anthology I always disagreed when George says Rubber Soul and Revolver are Part 1 and Part 2 of the same album. As great as Rubber Soul is, Revolver always seemed like a significant leap forward in songwriting eclecticism, sound, scope and vision and the two are very distinct in my mind.

This however always felt like Part 1 to Highway 61’s Part 2. Even if it does nod to his previous albums with the acoustic 2nd side, it feels like they could be a double album, particularly as Highway 61 was released only 4(!) months after this.

Despite hearing the 3 ‘big’ songs that kick off the first side thousands of times they remain fantastic bits of rock’n’rolled up folk music, the caustic political allusions of SHB and Maggie’s Farm forming a great duo with the romantic and lilting She Belongs to Me squashed in between. And the the remainder of the first side are brilliant too, romantic yearning on the sublime Love Minus Zero and scratching rock’n’roll stomping on Outlaw Blues, pulsing driving bluesiness of On the Road Again and the fantastic image laden Bob Dylan’s 115th Dream.

I often think Mr Tambourine Man feels slightly out of time on this album but in a good way. It feels much more like something off The Times or Another Side, but as a collection of internal rhymes and lyrical imagery it is, obviously, superb, surely one of his best no matter how many times you’ve heard it. I think I often overlook Gates of Eden, but it’s another fantastically evocative dream-like set of lyrics, with a slightly foreboding musical feel. It’s All Over Now Baby Blue is of course a classic too, a fantastic melodic bass line and tone and a wearied but emotionally detached lyric.

It’s Alright Ma is possibly my favourite Dylan songs, almost satirically Dylan-esque lyrics, full of grim anger and resigned frustration, highlighted by the almost bluegrass-folk guitar and the proto-rapped word filled delivery. As with the version on the Live 66 album, it is amazing how he can hold your attention with just guitar and voice. Fantastic.

Of course a straightforward 5.
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Playlist submission: It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)

Aja
The smoothest of the smoothest impeccably produced jazz soft-rock, with everything carefully considered and immaculately performed, or the softest of soft, insipid and emotionally empty jazz rock boringness?

I go with the former, although I totally see how it can go either way. I had it on CD back at Uni, but I never got into it, although, along with seemingly every other mid 40s white man in the western hemisphere, I’ve really got into it and them over the past few years.

I’m not sure it’s quite at the same level as Can’t Buy a Thrill, Countdown to Ecstasy or Pretzel Logic. It does have a sheen of remoteness to it, a slight sense of their quest for sonic fidelity overriding everything else, that those other albums don’t have, but it does have an overall feel and vibe I really love, not least, I think, due to how great that sound is, as warm and as enveloping as I imagine a mid 70s Californian evening would have been.

I don’t think there are any weak songs, but the opening trio of Black Cow, Aja and Deacon Blues is superb, particularly Black Cow with the jazz-soul female vocals and laid back flow. And Josie is great too, an excellent soul inflected track. But Peg really is the clear standout and not just because of De La Soul, it’s an absolutely brilliant sounding 70s jazz-pop classic with an unerringly catchy hook.

I often wonder if the recorder solo in Home at Last is a deliberate musical joke. It surely must be, it’s so out of place with the precision tooled construction of everything else. This and I Got the News are probably slightly weaker than the rest, although they’re still great.

I may slightly prefer those other albums, but this is still top notch and a fantastic example of classic mid- 70s jazz-rock-soul vibes that I could listen to repeatedly and never get bored of.
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Playlist submission: Peg

Soul Mining
I was kind of expecting more of this to be along the lines of the excellent This is the Day, but despite being enjoyable I found it frustrating on occasion.

Along with This is the Day, Giant and Perfect are superb bits of new wave synth pop. The relentless rhythms of Giant with the interweaving synth lines is excellent and Perfect’s xylophone and accordion assisted melody is fantastic.

In between it’s a little bit of a mixed bag, I’ve Been Waitin’ grew a great deal on me and The Sinking Feeling and Uncertain Smile are great, but the Bowie-aping vocals get a bit much on something like The Twilight Hour, the kind of song that The Blue Nile do much much better. Soul Mining has some nice Remain in Light vibes but again the vocal is slightly off-putting, even though the circular synth riff is very nice.

I enjoyed it without really taking to it a great deal. Some great songs, some great synths, but with the occasional annoying affectation, so it lands as a solid 3.
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Playlist submission:This is the Day

Vol. 4
Wheels of Confusion is a banger, superb sludgy riffing, it feels like it’s slightly behind the beat, giving it a great loping groove. Great sound on Iommi’s guitar too and The Straightener coda part is excellent with the mellotron adding a nice texture.

I didn’t realise that Changes was a Black Sabbath song, I thought it was just a generic song Ozzy and Kelly did. I didn’t much care for it, but I love the version here, the piano and string-sounding-mellotron is brilliantly evocative and mournful. And Laguna Sunrise is a similarly lovely, delicate piece of music and another great, atmospheric departure from their standard sound.

But their ‘standard’ sound is fantastic, Tomorrow’s Dream, Supernaut, Snowblind, Cornucopia, Under The Sun (love the booming, ominous bass) are all immensely enjoyable bits of riffy, bluesy metal, as on the other albums we’ve had the rhythm section is superb, lots of swing, groove and melody. And I really like the folky-boogie-metal of St Vitus’s Dance, close to Down Down in places but with a great hulking riff.

Even with all the riffs and heaviness, it never feels like they go down a moribund, boring, harder and faster for the sake of it, musical cul de sac, they incorporate other influences and meld the muculent brilliance of Iommi with the swinging excellent of their rhythm section to make an extremely listenable sound.

If I should have given Paranoid a 5, and Black Sabbath was a 4, this probably sits between the two. I’ve really enjoyed listening the last few days, and I’m keen to come back, so I think it just nudges to a 5.
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Playlist submission: Wheel of Confusion/The Straightener

The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady
This didn’t quite grab me in the way that other recent jazz albums have, neither quite having the smoky flavour of Charlie Parker or eccentricity and shifting soundscapes of Miles Davis, and in places it feels like an overly clarinet-ty Pink Panther-esque, 50s Disney film soundtrack.

There are some excellent passages though, the twinkly piano and sinuous horns at the start of Track B before it all gets a bit Minnie the Moocher/Trio advert, and the Spanish guitars leading into a moody cacophony on Track C is great, and I can appreciate the technical skill across it all, the piano in particular.

But overall this didn’t speak to me the way Kind of Blue or Bitches Brew or even Hot Rats did. Despite some great moments, and apart from Track C it felt to me like it had a slightly sludgy, treacly feel to it, like wading through jazz soup with heavy legs. Even though there are a lot of changes in tempo it doesn’t, for me, quite have the fleet footed kineticism of some of the other jazz albums I’ve really liked, lacking a bit of groove and swing.

Tough one to rate, it’s between 2 and 3, but I’ll go 3 as I think I will give it another try in future and there are some excellent moments and Track C is great.
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Playlist submission: Track C - Group Dancers

The Psychedelic Sound of the 13th Floor Elevators
Is there a genre that has such an outsize reputation compared to the number of actually good albums as 60s psychedelia? It is a genre I like, but I can’t think of many albums that are good from start to finish, it's much more of a compilation or playlist genre, there are a lot of gems and diamonds in the rough around and it’s far better served on something like Nuggets, rather than trudging though albums.

You’re Gonna Miss Me, with the slightly electric Dylan feel in its descending structure and acerbic off handedness, is a prime example, a classic Nuggets garage-psych-rock banger. And its similar to I Had Too Much to Dream Last Night by The Electric Prunes the other week in how it’s a great psych track amid a collection of largely forgettable and badly recorded bluesy garage psychedelia.

Don’t Fall Down, the Jagger-sounding Thru The Rhythm and Monkey Island are probably the pick of the those, but even they feel pretty inessential.

Like The Electric Prunes, it’s an appreciate the historical context but put the one good song on a playlist and forget about it album. 2.
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Playlist submission: You’re Gonna Miss Me

Dust
I don’t think I could name a Screaming Trees song, although I know Mark Lanegan is/was well regarded, and I assumed before listening that it would be in the grunge/metal also rans section, but I was pleasantly surprised and ended up enjoying it - it’s got some groove, and some folky blues influences and I like the varied instrumentation and psychedelic vibes - the middle eastern tones on Halo of Ashes, the harpsichord on Sworn and Broken, the organ on Dying Days and Dime Western.

He is a good singer, but he does get a bit generic 90s US alt rock singer at times, and his lyrics often paddle in that same pool also. But he does harmonise well with himself and he does hit upon some nice melodies - Dying Days and Sworn and Broken are pretty catchy.

It certainly has a slight tang of 90s grungey metal, but the prominent folk influences, harmonies, shades of non typical instrumentation as well as some nice melodic lead guitar that elevates it above a lot of those bands. It's not totally my cup of tea, but I’d happily give it another listen, making it a pleasantly surprising mid to high 3.
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Playlist submission: Sworn and Broken

Car Wheels on a Gravel Road
I’ve never listened to this, despite having always been very aware of it.
It’s quite 90s sounding, particularly the space in the drums, but it's not too distracting, and you can definitely hear Steve Earle’s hand in things, it does sound like a few of his late 90s/early 00s albums.

It also has a slight Sheryl Crow feel on the less overtly country songs, sharing a similar tasteful and enjoyable atmosphere, but with a bit more earthiness and rasp to her voice - although sometimes it feels as though it needs a little more of that grit and earthiness to match the album title and the evocative artwork.

The title track is great, I love the chorus, and that little descending guitar figure on 2 Kool 2 Be-4-Gotten (such a 90s title) is rather lovely and it has a great vocal. Concrete and Barbwire is an excellent country ditty. And I love the Louisiana/creole/french sounding accordion on Lake Charles, taking it in a slightly unexpected direction. Can’t Let Go I like too, and Greenville is a nice downcast track. The slide heavy Joy is great, a nice shot of dusty bluesiness and it finishes with the excellent Jackon.

In between the songs are decent if a little forgettable, so I think this lands as a very high 3, not quite making it to 4, as its just missing a few more really good songs, despite her excellent voice and the nice atmosphere
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Playlist submission: Car Wheels on a Gravel Road

Black Monk Time
Another one of those classic lost albums that I’ve not listened to, and also another YouTube album as it’s not on Tidal.

For the most part, it’s much as I thought it would be, sloppily energetic and raucous proto punk garage rock, with guitars, shouting and organs bandied about willy nilly. Monk Times’s repetitive bass guitar and drums create a great frantic groove and I really like the shouty singy proselytising about Vietnam.

Across much of it it’s those repeating rhythms that stand out, I can see why it was an influence on Kraftwerk and Krautrock and why people keep talking about it now, it’s simple, propulsive and minimalist, while the bass, drums and organs supplement the sound, with occasional very instrumental passages breaking out, like on Boys are Boys, Girls are Choice

It is remarkable how ahead of its time it sounds it is for 1965, if not always musically then certainly rhythmically and certainly attitudinally, before many of the West Coast acid rock bands did their garagey bluesy psychedelic shuffling in subsequent years and obviously way before punk happened in the mid 70s.

Aside from Monk Time and Boys are Boys, Girls are Choice, Higgle-dy-Piggle-Dy, I Hate You, with it’s a snaking bass line, Oh How To Do Now, We Do, Wie Du and Love Came Tumblin’ Down are the highlights

It’s a really fun listen, although the overall quality of the songs (and recording) probably rightfully takes a back seat to the attitude and feel of the whole thing, and it’s relentlessly rhythmical, naive, outsider-art, anything goes proto-punk directness and subsequent influence on loads of great bands is probably where its the majority of its value and significance lie.

It’s definitely more than a historical curio though, the crazed energy and sense of originality do give it a nice freshness, although it’s debatable how often I’ll come back to it, which puts it on the cusp of 3 and 4. It’s close to a 4 but I’ll stick with a high 3, it’s both very enjoyable and very interesting but it’s probably not going to go on regular rotation, even though I will listen again.
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Playlist submission: Monk Time

Emperor Tomato Ketchup
I’ve never listened to a Stereolab album, even though I’ve always felt they’d be a band I would like.

Metronomic Underground is superb, the hypnotic groove and drone, the slight bossa nova vibes and some nicely layered sounds all constructed with a light touch, really lovely. When it hits a similar feel on Les Yper-Sound, the title track and Motoroller Scalatron and it’s great; excellent bass, nice breathy vocals, hooky keyboards, organs and guitars, kind of like Kraftwerk + a bit of Belle & Sebastian + a bit of French chanteur.

I really like their enjoyably experimental leanings and the vocals slipping between French and English, as well as their slightly atonal melodies, recalling X Ray Specs or Nico or The Slits, with a kind of nice, flat, cool detachedness.

It’s all very enjoyable with only Monstre Sacre not quite hitting the heights of the rest of it. It started off as a 4, it dipped to a 3 and then came back to a solid 4, a very good album.
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Playlist submission: Metronomic Underground

Leftism
I remember this being quite a big deal at school when it came out, but it passed me by then, I was too busy saving my pennies for Cast and Bluetones albums. I did buy the one after this, Rhythm & Stealth though, which had a few crackers; Dusted, Phat Planet (Guiness!), Africa Shox and Swords.

Anyhow, I digress, and this is another great 90s electronic album alongside the Orbital albums we’ve had, but with a much more pronounced reggae/dub/ragga vibe, particularly on the opening track, Inspection and the typically performatively acerbic Lydon assisted Open Up.

Release the Pressure is great, in a way that a song combining Earl Sixteen’s vocals, a techno beat, ragga piano and the Macarena shouldn’t necessarily be. Similar to the ragga vibes on Release the Pressure, Afro Left uses North African influences with an almost samba beat to build another very good track, followed by the Jazzy and ambient Melt, a great bit of sequencing after the first two tracks.
Song of Life is great too, with its incorporation of the When The Levee Breaks beat as it pulses and builds. Although I like the Massive Attack feel of Original and the swarming synth sound of Black Flute and the Josh Wink-ness of Space Shanty, the middle of the album is a bit of a dip after the first four songs, and it’s nice to come back to the dubby ragga of Inspection before the excellent Open Up and then the gentle spaceyness of 21st Century Poem.

It's one of those albums where you can focus and appreciate the production, the craft and the sound, or you can zone out and appreciate the overall feel, and again it's a good one to work to. It is a bit long though, 69 minutes is a lot for most albums, but particularly for ones in the electronic genre where it can be hard to create enough dissimilitude over such a long run time, which accounts for the dip in the middle, even though it is very well sequenced.

Will definitely listen again, making it a solid 4.
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Playlist submission: Release the Pressure