Reviews by jkegz

3/5 - Definitely not an album I would have listened to on my own, especially after being relatively disappointed with the album cuts on Wings/Band on the Run. Here Paul is noodling around with different song ideas entirely on his own, and while I can't put myself in the place of heartbroken Beatles fans who I'm sure felt let down by the simplicity, I think it's charming and a great listen.

3/5 - I guess I'd describe this as prog-lite, which I'm OK with. I like the keyboard sounds and general pop sensibilities of the songs. I'm not going to have a Supertramp ephiphany, but I'll take some "Bloody Well Right" now and again. This choice for the 1,001 betrays the heavy British bias of the list.

3/5 - I’m being extremely generous because this album belongs on the list given how ubiquitous it was in the 90s, and the musicianship is solid. That said, I loathe Anthony Kiedis’ vocals and pretty much everything about his whole persona. I give him a 1, and Point Break is the classic film it is, because he gets shot in the foot, howls in pain, and exits early.

Why is this 73 minutes?

3/5 - Are you telling me we already knew this country was this fucked up in the early 90s, and we just kept driving down the road to doom? Man, we're dumb. If Nostradamus decided to do a solo record in the vocal stylings of Chuck D and used an AI band name generator, he would have made this record.

This is some damning earnest shit here. I feel frivolous and shallow by comparison.

4/5 - I don’t listen to salsa music. After this album, I still don’t listen to salsa music, but now I have a go to record for when I start listening to salsa music.

I will play this at all my moonlit, backyard pool parties. We will dance the night away and have a fucking great time, until we realize we were laughing and ignorantly enjoying the story of a tragic double murder. Then everyone will go home.

4/5 - Merritt's magnum opus is a giant mixed bag that is a great fit for this list, just not necessarily on an album-per-day pace. It's asking a lot to listen to this all at once, but there's some wonderful gems throughout. Come Back to SF, Book of Love, Kiss Me Like You Mean It, Luckiest Guy on the Lower East Side, and several others would have made a killer pop album of 12 songs, but there's also plenty of duds too -- it's 69 songs about love songs after all.

This lyric from Acoustic Guitar made me laugh:
Acoustic guitar, if you think I play hard
Well, you could have belonged to Steve Earle
Or Charo or GWAR, I could sell you tomorrow
So bring me back my girl
You'd better bring me back my girl

4/5 - Kinda odd having 2 SY albums in the same week, but there's worse problems to have. Love Schizophrenia, Tuff Gnarl, Pipeline/Kill Time, Hot Wire My Heart, Catholic Block. I think I listened to this 4 times yesterday.

3/5 - I liked this well enough. Probably would have been a better listen with headphones to hear all the sounds. Felt like middle of the road british indie music. Essential? Not really.

3/5 - I felt like I was listening to a troubadour at a ren faire for 40 minutes. If that's your thing, this is wonderful, and probably a top 10 album for you. I mostly found it beautiful, but unmemorable in any way. Still, it's a better album to listen to than many of the 2s I've handed out, so I'm going with a 3.

2/5 - I'll never listen to this again, but the cinematic sounds were kinda fun for a bit, and I enjoyed a few tracks. The sound is relentless, and like many hip-hop albums of the time, it's just entirely too long. Wu-Tang will never be my thing, and I'm OK with that.

4/5 - I honestly could rate this anywhere between a 2 and a 4. I’m going to go on the high end, because despite the backstory, writing credits, etc, it feels like an important album for the time, and I enjoyed at least half the songs, and wouldn’t mind listening again. The whole project makes you think about how much music is borrowed, stolen, imitated, and pasted together to create new art. I’m not gonna untangle that with my insignificant rating here.

5/5 - Noisy in all the right ways. One of the best leadoff tracks ever. I love Sprawl and Hey Joni. Wandering guitars, far off vocals, punk art. Just a great package that challenges and pleases my eardrums.

3/5 - This is at the tail end of the metal era I enjoy, starting in the early 80s. Holy Wars... and Hangar 18 are both pretty awesome, so this rises on those alone for me. I doubt this is going to turn anyone on to thrash if you don't like the style, but Rust In Peace is a solid pick for the list in the genre.

2.5/5 - Innocuous and twee California songs. I don't have a whole lot to say about this album, other than there's a whole lot of early 2000s indie that I'd put above this on the list. It was fine, but not essential listening.

2/5 - I liked the first song a good bit. I lost interest somewhere in what was maybe the third track. I'd need to pay a lot more attention to get anything out of this. It was definitely a sad album with a lot of expression, but I didn't connect.

2/5 - I don't mind listening to Muse as much as some of the other 2s I've rated, but I hardly think this is essential listening. It's overly bombastic arena rock, that I have to admit works really well on the big stage, having seen them in a festival setting ages ago (and enjoyed the spectacle they put on).

This album feels like the music equivalent of a cheesy, summer blockbuster movie. You know it's not high art, but if you know what you're in for, you can enjoy the manufactured drama, and then go do something else with your time.

4/5 - The front half of this album is really outstanding. Crosseyed and Painless is one of my favorites. Adrian Belew’s guitar work is really really good. Overall, I just love the soundscape the band explores here and how many bands this influenced in the early 2000s indie scene that I really appreciate.

2/5 - Snooze-croon adult contemporary. Not for me.

1/5 - I thought this music and their videos were cool when I was 9. I grew out of that by the time I was 11. Eliminator is the definition of lame.

TV Dinners is the worst song I’ve heard on this list, and that’s an accomplishment.

5/5 - This is an easy 5 for me. I had this on cassette when I started driving, and I played it on endless loop back then. Every song here has its own mood and is so distinct, but I recognize much of that is from familiarity. One of the best albums from the late 80s.