Reviews by john

If I never listen to another 60’s psychedelic diatribe about kings and rulers or a oneness that has been revealed to the narrator (who never sings well), I think I’ll be ok. Whatever the opposite charisma is, it can be assigned to this record.

I never recovered from the lalalala’s on “Witches Hat”. What some might find twee and charming, I found to be uninspired and bland. It’s a 1/5

Obligatory "I dont speak french bout found this base-level enjoyable".

Without knowing the lyrical content on first listen, things sort of mesh together into one blend of songs until he locks tf in on "Quartier nord".

Hard to get too granular on my judgement of this one, I casually enjoyed and was also pretty happy it ended when it did. Soft 3/5

There were times this record got under my skin for a few reasons. Number one, the masters and sonic quality killed me. Specifically, the drums sound SO thin. The snare has so much reverb on it, yet has no depth. It was like me tapping my nail on the wall of an empty room. Ugh. And second, the sound this band puts forth is an awkward middle ground between the ends of post-punk and the beginnings of REM.

This all really sucks because under the middling aesthetics are some super catchy compositions performed by guys that clearly put their all into it. The tempo switches and anthemic choruses on "Back From Somewhere" are a good example of the effort put into this project.

My frustrations did fade with time as I came to accept the way this groups sounded. But the inverse also kinda came to be true all at once too? I got bored of the same song feeling like it was coming down the pipe over and over again, even if the energy was good. Very conflicting.

Ultimately, I had to drag myself to the finish line. I was good and done by "It's Not Peculiar". 2/5 stars -- I can see this bands exact place in the development of pop and alternative music, but I think The Replacements also eventually took up a similar space and do it better.

Hey look! An album where Brazilian Portuguese is spoken and it’s not from someone with the last name Gilberto! On that note, there’s some really cool fusion songs referencing Brazilian sounds. “Ratamahatta”, “Breed Apart”, and “Lookaway” all are so textured and unique in their pulling from Brazilian music and native culture.

So the cool factor is through the roof on this album. But it didn’t have to be over an hour. “Jasco” was so needed purely because I was exhausted with the wall of metal sound I was experiencing without relief.

I’d say toss out some of the more prototypical metal stuff in the middle in favor of some of the creative pulls like “Itsari” and we’d have a masterpiece on our hands. Music that references indigenous peoples in a reverential manner always ages well. Strong 3/5

Music that surely made it big on the blogs, but never cracked American radio iirc. I think the states had a fair line of reasoning to stonewall this album, I’m not blown away by anything on here. A lot of it rests above a baseline of quality, but none of it rockets off into excellence.

“Isle Of Her” and others sound like an attempt to recreate Damon Albarn’s voice in a slightly more indie rock / alt-dance setting.

It’s hard to give this record the light of day when Justice and MGMT were setting the blogosphere on fire at the same time. This album doesnt move the soul like those guys did. 3/5

It took two whole songs for me to be reminded of the “115” black ops zombies track. Classic.

She has an impressive voice and a knack for meeting the moment no matter how grand (or scary) it is. A good mixture of melodic sensibility and visceral vocals. Love the amen break on “Unravel” that lead into a soft piano section. This is a melodic dubstep drop away from being an Excision & Illenium collab. Then some hardcore style vocals on “Dying To Forget” after, thats range. And the various textures on “Ribs” are really pretty too.

I’m super impressed by Poppy’s raw singing talent and I’d like all my 4/5 stars to go directly to her. I’m ultimately under-qualified to be a fair judge to anything metal, I listen to it less than most any major genre. I can hear how metalheads may call this a very clean but maybe too overproduced album? Idk.

But I have a lot more to say, contextually! This album came out in 2026! I feel fairly qualified to provide a list of albums from this year that I think are more worth your time. I’ll have logged 100,000 minutes on Spotify and around 3/4ths of that is new music queued up for work each week. Here’s a handful of albums that are more worth your time imo:

• trinket - tsubi club
• Canada - John Beltran
• U - Underscores
• Heavenly Body - Eartheater
• Where Light Pauses - Abul Mogard, Rafael Anton Irisarri
• Poetics Of A New Estate - Soli City
• Lost Weekend - Phoebe Bridgers
• No Rest For The Wicked - AZ Chike
• Q: From Where Do Our Primal Instincts Originate? A: MTV! - Portraits Of Tracy

Effective in what it wants to do. But almost every song is too needlessly long. I got a bit bored as the music sat in an always zone between active listening music and background music. Perhaps it’s too easy to criticize this record just for living in the shadow of Voodoo.

“Shit Damn Motherfucker” was my favorite song. Frank Ocean surely had to be taking pointers. Strong 2/5

It’s neat that they can take the shoegaze aesthetics and leave the fucking boring compositions of shoegaze behind.

The middle third of this record kicks into high gear, from “Many Mirrors” to “Pomeranian Spinster” they find their groove.

Ultimately, this album isn’t nearly close enough to be considered for a dozen albums that should be included on this list to represent the best music of the past 5 years, but it’s certainly fun and easy to listen to; occasionally to its detriment, but often to its credit.

I know for a fact that this is the Paul Simon record I’ve got to get through on this list. I’ve enjoyed all his albums so much that I’ve held off from doing a deep dive on his discography to preserve the joy and spontaneity of seeing his name pop up again on this generator.

I’ll listen to a song like “Run That Body Down” on here and initially feel like meh this was a sound good for coffee shops in the 2000’s then I look at the release date of this album and realize how stellar it sounds for 1972. Sonically it’s very clean, but it’s real attraction is the variety bag of instrumental choices coupled with how well Paul Simon creates a sense of space in the recordings. If I wielded a gift as great as his, I too would want these songs to be spacious and focused on my voice/stories. Simon’s vocal delivery specifically on “Papa Hobo” is fascinating.

That being said. I think it’s fair to lodge the complaint that the sum of these parts is something that’s a bit too safe. There’s a certain wavelength Paul Simon stays within, only ever changing lanes rarely and with calculation. Maybe I’m being unfair, holding this album up to the vibrancy of Graceland or the serenity of Hearts And Bones, but this is a very straightforward project.

I was incredibly encouraged by the first song, especially that piano twinkling in the background.

“Holding On” is an incredible track. I feel like it lays the groundwork for house music tropes to come, while also reminiscing on the Chic sound that came before it — especially the way that violin melody plays over a hypnotic, looping groove. Really love that song.

As “Back To Life” came on, it hit me that this is the song that this record has been included on the list for. Not to say that the rest of the record is bad, but a lot of it does feel a bit inconsequential. The whole record is indeed great for clubs, the low end on nearly every song is pristine.

That M Beat remix was the saving grace of a second half of the record that got boring with some recycled ideas.

Pleasant and thorough 3/5

Man these guys knew how to write a pop chorus. Every anthemic chorus on the front half of this record has a moment where they invert a chord or add on new one in at just the right time while Liam Gallagher is chanting something catchy. Even Wonderwall, I’m not really tired of its pretty simplicity.

I think there’s a Bob Dylan effect at play here, where the songs are fundamentally fantastic, but the performances are a bit rough around the edges and all similar-sounding. And the back half of the record, like so many pop records, is weaker than the front half. A strong “Champagne Supernova” saves this thing from its tracklisting free fall.

There’s a grounded lucidity in their hits that leaves me unable to deny their capabilities. There just isn’t enough of it. 3/5

If you’re a member of the Gilberto family congratulations you get a free album on this list.

I’m finding that this style of samba/bossa nova is a high floor, low ceiling sound. It’s an effort to not enjoy this music, but it’s also an effort to see this as a crucially important piece of art. Not that it has to be, this is clearly easy listening music.

A few noteworthy songs. “Parade (A Banda)” was really fun and broke the mold a bit as far as what the first half of the record was sounding like. “Canoeiro” was a hyper-colorful song with a lot crammed into a few minutes.

Everything else was staggered melodies and rimshots. Strong 3/5

Hmm. I believe Ive let the audience-generated mythos lead me to expect too much of The Police. I thought Synchroncity 2 was largely overhyped. This record less so, but still perhaps living in the shadow of its own legacy a bit.

The highlights for me weren’t the hits, as I’ve heard them ten million times before. The highlights were the quirkier parts, like the spoken bits on “On Any Other Day”.

Is it good? Absolutely. Sturdy yet unique pop. Is it a masterpiece? I’d stop short of that. 3/5

A delightful and uncomplicated version of grunge. Probably due to the fact that this came slightly before the advent of Pearl Jam’s Ten.

“Something So Clear” perked my ears up a little, but “Pokin Around” was by far the coolest track. A perfect blend of a pop-inspired melody strung into the fabric of grunge aesthetics.

3/5 I casually enjoyed this one shoutout to Bellevue Washington shoutout to Seattle Washington

It’s impossible to be objective about this album, or say anything that hasn’t already been said about it. So I won’t do either.

Do I give this a 5 for how it’s so accessible and succinct that it’s generated a legacy of adoration by pretty much anyone? Do I give it a 4 because it’s a little too soft and barren for my liking?

I won’t get too hung up on my nitpicks, I’ll go 5/5. It’s not my perfect 5/5, but to deny the musicality and widespread affection this record facilitates is to deny myself of something as simple as laughing at a good joke or making myself some comfort food.

“Gold Dust Woman” is a great way to end this record, it’s like “The Chain” in that it’s got some actual teeth to it.

My favorite part of this record is something tertiary; a reminder about how they did the live version of “Don’t Stop” with the marching band style section. Such a good melody to translate to horns like that

An album where it’s best to work backwards in the tracklisting to understand the artist. The closing title track is clear as day a tortured soul working out the internal and external chaos he’s feeling. A very grandiose display of despair and the symptoms of turmoil.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t give him the right to consult the list of bad gamer words on “Jesus Hates Faggots”. He really just rips a list of em. It left a bad enough taste in my mouth to bump this thing down a star.

The rest of the first half of the album is a little exercise in various singer/songwriter techniques, or drawings of inspiration from a handful of the greats. I liked the stark simplicity of “Silver Platter Club”.

As was the case with Randy Newman, just because you’re being a smart as about a point you have doesn’t give you an excuse to say that word, or in this case, THOSE words

I don’t doubt Stephen Still’s commitment to his craft, you can hear how earnest he is in songs like “Colorado”. He seems to have assembled a group of musicians who match both his vision and skill.

But holy hell I don’t want to listen to over an hour of this. It just doesn’t scratch any itches for me, especially when there’s plenty of CSN on this list.

“So Begins The Task” was the prettiest of the songs, but only because it leans into that much more appealing CSN sound he had with the group. Pains me to say I’m giving this a 2/5, even if it’s charming at points

I’m not gonna give this a 1/5 because Nick Cave still pulls a lot off with his vocals, but most everything else about this album is too hazy. It’s definitely not something you *should* listen to. The album artwork is more compelling than its musical content.

“Dead Joe” was fun for how crazy it was. “Several Sins” was the best song imo.

2/5 pretty hectic

The rubber band effect is intensifying, where I’m more often having extreme reactions to albums I find good or bad. Unfortunately, this is the latter.

Steven Tyler is going on 2 full decades of being unapologetically horny at the release of this album. When you know what he did to gain control of the life of that underage girl he was into, the first song on this record makes everything feel a bit DOA. I don’t care how many hooks the group manages, much of this is tacky at best, and horrifically on-the-nose at worst.

Yucky lowly 2/5

I’ll spare the mega crashout I experience every time I see one of the newest edition albums because I already crashed out in the cure review. Also this one is a slightly better pick. It didn’t need to be on here, I think brat is coming soon since I only have 130 albums left. But still, this is trending in the right direction. Since brat has yet to be reviewed, I’ll also save the diatribe on how excellent charli xcx generally is as a pop musician.

This record is fine. Better than fine as a movie accompaniment, but just fine on its own. Melodramatic as ever. “Dying For You” is such a pretty song.

I’ll take a 3/5 for the road