Reviews by james_mir

What happens when punk meets some kind of experimentalism? Nothing so remarkable. It's good, but I'll forget about it tomorrow.

I like listening to some of Billie Holiday's songs, but this is not her best compilation.
Sadly, this one was selected for the 1001 list since it is still very good but sounds old-fashioned in many songs, and it was not her best vocal work, even being great.

The third Prince album I got on the list and even being too much "pop" for my ears, it's the best one until now, and it has the best Prince stuff (in my opinion, of course), that is his musical variety on instruments and themes as in the lyrics.

It's the third I got and the first I really agree that deserves to be on a list like this.

It looks like a boring rock electronic-like album good enough to be on the list of 1001 boring electronic albums to listen to, but some songs like "Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell" and "Are You a Hypnotist??" makes it a little bit more remarkable of attention. I liked it on a Friday morning, but it's not the perfect fit for any other mood.

The epitome of dad rock. Now also live!

The first songs were good, but they ended up being the definition of generic music. I liked the first ones precisely because they remember some other bands and other songs.

Since I listened to a previous Waits album some months ago, this was very unexpected. I was ready for classic bluesy rock and got industrial-like sounds that looked like music.

I'll rate it with a 4 for the surprise. Give me more.

Fantastic voice and flattened music. It is not unlikeable, and it's clear that this influenced some modern songs, but it's forgettable.

It's not legally allowed rate this album with less than 4 stars, even if it is not being so great as I expected and sounds a little bit old-fashioned for modern sensibilities.

Ray Charles is not my favorite singer, but his importance cannot be forgotten.

I understand why this album is ever on the list of worst albums at the Global stats of this site, but I think this is very unfair.
Yes, the songs are not great, but in 1001 (and some extras) albums, we have soundtracks and many Live albums, so why not an RPG soundtrack directly from a Playstation One game from the 90s? And they influenced Led Zepellin (according to Wikipedia), which should count as some points for them.

I'll rate it with 3* because having this strange stuff around is fair and sometimes necessary.

I'll forget everything I thought I knew about punk. 15 minutes of pure anger are what I'll call punk from now on.

I had never heard about Joan Armatrading, and her voice is lovely. I didn't enjoy the album so much since it's pretty standardized, as I expected when Wikimedia classifies it as "singer-songwriter" style. Apparently, It's pretty hard to be impressive in the singers-songwriters community, and it's easy to sound like any other in the same community, even with excellent voice work.

Apparently, "Talking Heads" is really not the best band for me. I liked this album, but not enough to remember tomorrow.

Muse was my favorite band some years ago, and then I suddenly changed to listening to other stuff. I'm back to this album again. I think it's longer than it should be, but it's still a precious release.

I don't know exactly how, but these songs leave me in another state. Nostalgia perhaps? Maybe, but it's still worth it a lot.

After this third Kraftwerk album on the list (until now), I guess I finally understand their purpose. They are not good albums to listen to, but they are fantastic as companion songs for reading or annoying work sessions.

I discovered it by coincidence, and I wouldn't say I like the album as a whole, but understanding it is part of the way to finally getting why they deserve at least 3 spots on the list. Maybe after listening to the whole Kraftwerk discography and understanding the hidden mystery of electronic music, I'll enjoy it.

I'm betting that I'm losing some life secret that will enable me to access the hidden knowledge about the great war against the capitalist aliens that command our lives, just letting us access these small pieces of peaceful songs for the long and annoying job sessions.

Yes, listening to this album is like reading this text: a craziness.

I was expecting nothing, and I got a lovely folk-like album with good voice work. This is an excellent highlight in a week with many "standard" albums, and I'll give it 4 * just because of the fun time.

Reading the Wikipedia page, it's easy to find out why he deserves one spot on the 1001 list. Listen to the album, I think it's nice but far from remarkable.

Apparently, I've received a lot of punk and post-punk albums here on the list these last few days. However, I'll not complain about it so soon since I discovered and rediscovered a lot of good bands and albums.

This "Elastica" starts very well and declines at the end with a more "pop" mood that does not look connected with the album's first part, but it's still a lovely release for punk and post-punk fans.

I'm not sure it deserves a spot on the 1001 list since it's somehow too much " standard, " but it definitely deserves a place in my ears.

I never got exactly all the hype on Sufjan Stevens, and after listening to this album, I still don't. However, it's impossible to do not to admit it has a bag of qualities on the instrumental part.

Some songs are catchy.

In summary, I'll not join any fan club of Sufjan Stevens or something like that, but I'll sure look with more attention to his new albums to check if it's me that is losing all his geniality (high probability, I guess 🤣)

I guess that in almost 600 albums, this is one of the first albums that I recognize as a punk album in essence (musically, lyrically, attitude, etc.), without any unnecessary extra (like it happens with many post-punk or hardcore jazz, for example).

I liked it very much, and I should check more stuff from The Damned!