Reviews by john

Oooh somebody new that I know nothing about! This is a really cool album opener, reminds me a bit of Radiohead meets Dan Deacon in terms of some progressive, energetic production thats a bit atmospheric, a bit off-the-wall. Indie meets electronica, that’s what this is! “Loops in the Secret Society” was a really cool listen, she has such a clear idea about how to build up a song and be additive at just the right times. Another highlight was the little bleepy synth refrain in the next song “The Architect.”
But my song of the album award absolutely goes to “The Lightning Back” for its infectious, quaint indietronica perfection. I hear lots of The Postal Service in this one, which is about the highest compliment I can give a song. Whirling, nasaly synths that are easy on the ears, a bit-crushed beat meant to induce a little head-nodding. Airy singing about a lovers impact on the singer. Beautiful stuff, so good that it got a replay out of me before I could finish the album!
Another shoutout to the cool vocal intro and outro on “Ravenspoint” that helped elevate the tension a bit.
This album is a great deviation from the manly rock&roll or grand concept albums. Sometimes all you need is some easy, well-made indietronica to get you through the day

Melodramatic, grand, and full of emotion. There is a sense of scale and fullness (for lack of a better term) that I haven’t heard on previous Cure albums, or many 80’s albums in general for that matter. The low end on “Prayers for Rain” that comes in at about 40 seconds is absolutely insane, it adds so much sonic mass and depth to the song. Then Robert Smith comes in with those echoey, delayed, reverb vocals. Wow! Fantastic production there. Then the vocal crescendos near the end of “Disintigration” really stuck with me too. So full of drama and longing. While it isn’t up my alley, I can’t deny that the cure stuck the landing with this one. Soft 4/5!

Almost pissed off that we got some niche indie film soundtrack until I read about the concept of this album not actually having a real movie to go with it. I needed the concept to understand this record, then it instantly became cooler. Perfect? No, not at all. But really cool. I’m reminded of a few other musicians I really like when I listen to this. First, the concept reminds me of the M Machine Metropolis EP series, where there was some loose conceptual lore written down to build up the world of the music. Second, in MSS’s haziest, craziest moments, like “The Swinging Detective” I’m reminded of DJ Shadow’s “Endtroducing” with how music like this can be greater than the sum of its parts when you give it the time and space to develop. Lastly, I feel like I can draw a direct line between this album and some of the stuff Onehotrix Point Never was doing in his best years. “The Most Beautiful Girl In the World” is my highlight on here and super reminds me of OPN soundfonts with that touch of surrealism.
Neat stuff, worth a listen, won’t go back to it, but can be appreciated in a vacuum anytime.

“It’s no Master of Puppets” - me, and probably most other people. While this album is no slouch, I just don’t think it holds a torch to its predecessor. There are some moments worth listening for here, like the really chunky, slower “Harvester or Sorrow” which slows down its powerchord formula to a pace that makes you feel the thump of the drums and guitars. Then the obvious highlight on here is “One” which is truly among the best metal songs you’ll ever hear, if not the singular best. Metal will never be my in my powerhouse, but I can still appreciate this album in the same way I appreciated MoP: incredibly clean production and composition that stands the test of time, an instantly recognizable sound, and solid storytelling/imagery. Sadly, a point down for this being too similar to MoP

All I’m saying is that it’s very fitting that we get these guys on the day of the Grammys. Arcade Fire again huh. Unfortunately I don’t think this will be the last time we see them, I’m still waiting for “Funeral” which is their big record thats really worth its weight in gold. Early on, the formula is still clear here: anthemic ho-hey’ing that juxtaposes bits of suburban utopia with all sorts of existential unease.
“Intervention” is a sign of the times song about the war in Iraq, and I’m honestly surprised it took four tracks to get to protesting that time of American imperialism - three years earlier, American Idiot blew the doors down for any band to throw its hat in the protest ring.
This makes sense as a follow-up record: you just won album of the year, why charge it up?
Go ahead and use this album as you would the aforementioned Funeral - put it on and ride your bike through a town like Mill Creek WA on a nice summer evening. Welcome the nice breeze in your face as you guide on the empty, smooth neighborhood roads. Notice the strangeness of a gated community or all the American flags on the excessively nice, eerily quiet houses.

The Bee Gees! Finally, The Bee Gees! I credit my parents playing their BeeGees records when I was young for shaping my inclination for vibrant, melodic dance music today. So it was a breakneck shock to hear these guys before the soaring strings and harmonized disco choruses. Like, this is genuinely just an early 70’s record full of rock/pop/singer-songwriter ballads.
All that being said, it doesn’t take long to hear the blueprints for their transitional success, as “Israel” has some of those string sections towards its second half while Barry Gibb goes on a little crooning tangent with his signature wobbly vibrato thingy he does so well. A few tracks later, “It’s Just the Way” sounds a bit too much like an easy -listening Beatles song. Similar guitar tone and you can practically hear Paul and John harmonizing together here. It’s also at this point that the BeeGees would like to get it through your head that this album is all about wishing and yearning. Some of its hopeful, most of it is hopeless; “Remembering” makes me sure that one of these guys just got a divorce or is character acting as a divorced man.
A high point in the record for me is the beat switch on “Somebody Stop the Music” to something more fun and swanky, even if it still has Beatles fingerprints all over it, which STILL continues onto the title track.
I’m left wishing for a bit more variety, like the grand sense of a silver lining on “Dont Wanna Live Inside Myself” which should have been the closing song. Good I’m moments, does a lot of the same sulking for the majority of the time.

I don’t really have much to say here other than that I love just how much is constantly going on, instrumentally speaking. Whereas The Verve album a few days ago felt like a relentless maelstrom of sound that you just wanted a break from, this album fills your ears with so many fun textures and sounds. All the syncopated percussion going on at once. And just when you think you’ve started to nail down it’s happy formula, the record hits you with something like the 1:45 mark in “A Historia De Jorge” when that starry synth sweeps in out of nowhere. Super cool, super infectious stuff. Hard not to get caught in the good vibes here. My personal favorite is “Cavaleiro Do Cavalo Imaculado” for its tempo and energy

Damn I kinda enjoyed this album. But I understand if the enjoyment is more personal than universal. I think it was 70% surprisingly good production, 30% occasional good vocal hook. “Liberation” has that super pretty 90’s two-step beat with some beachy keyboards and synths behind it. “Yesterday When I Was Mad” is what I like to call a SEGA Sound Team Sonic Riders type beat, which furthers my point that the production here is very forward-thinking! “The Theatre” had a really dramatic pre-chorus/chorus. Then “Go West” had to be my highlight. The 90’s version of Canon In D, but also with those distinctly Eastern European backing vocals? Really cool touch. As I’m writing this review, I’m realizing how much this one snuck up on me. There are still some painfully 90’s sounds on here, “One and One Make Five” had an intro that soured the rest of the track for me. But overall, I’m impressed. Tight, thumping drum programming, non-offensive synth/keys choices, memorable enough top lines. Soft 4/5 stars, who would’ve thought!

It’s 5am, Wednesday morning at work. It’s cold as hell, our heater stopped working. I’m tired, another 9th place at UW melee last night. But the vibes are all good. So maybe the tired is getting to me, but I feel like this album couldn’t give me a break. Sonically, it was just so constantly full of noise. I want to understand this trend, I want to know what led to this being somewhat commonplace in the genre of british pop / post rock / y2k rock. Did Radiohead just blow the doors down for this sound and then everyone tried to follow suit? I could barely grasp onto any melody or lyrical hook because it felt so buried in the brigade of guitar reverb but also prolonged vocal performances but also loud percussion but also full looping bass lines. “Brainstorm Interlude” is perhaps the worst offender of this noise blitzkrieg. My highlight is probably the more mellow reprieve from all the noise, “On Your Own.”
I wanted to like this more than I did, and think I would like the songs if they were composed and performed with less of a deluge of reverb and echo and noise coming at me from all angles

Ahhhh this is such a breath of fresh air. I think that can be said for all the Stevie wonder classics during this time period. Even the downtrodden songs on here are still somehow so joyous. Everything is sung with a pure heart. I do think Songs In The Key Of Life kinda sets the bar even impossibly higher and somehow this album doesn’t quite live up to that same bar. But this is still such a pleasant, refreshing, affirming listen. My highlights are the obvious ones, “Superstition” reminds me of watching I-Robot as a kid. And the opener “You Are The Sunshine Of My Life” is an elite-tier love song.
Soft 4/5 stars

I have nothing good to say about this record, or Smashing Pumpkins, outside of that i appreciate the grand instrumental compositions on occasion here.
I came into this record with hopes of having a better experience than I did with Mellon Collie (having two of these albums make this 1001 is overkill), but what I got was much of the same. I cannot stand Billy Corgans voice, I hear no appeal in it other than it being instantly recognizable, if that matters to you. His singing is genuinely grating on the ears when it’s at its lowest points on this record. “Disarm” is a fine song I suppose, but only if you could have the magic powers to mute the audio channel that plays back Billy Corgan’s vocals. I understand the appeal of Death Grips more than I understand the appeal of Smashing Pumpkins. I have nothing else good to say about this record, so I will not say anything else at all.

At the opening song, I thought to myself “was ZZ Top going for that sweet sweet MTV spot??”
Then by the second song, specifically when that little electric guitar lick came in at the end of the chorus, I thought “damn were they secretly good at it too?”
It kept going too! Everybody knows “Sharp Dressed Man” but my highlight of the record for me is the song after, “I Need You Tonight.” A really cool night crawler style track.
I have a problem with how horribly legs is sung, but somehow ZZ Top is saved with their general scuzzy aesthetic not setting the bar too high in the first place. As is the case with all pop-leaning records, it tapers off in the second half in a noticeable way. This is briefly saved by a whole song giving tribute to TV Dinners. But then we are right back to the objectifying women and attempting to make more arena rock hits.
I’m a bit torn on what to give this. Ive gotta remember what this album was trying to achieve - I must remind myself that this band made a huge sonic transition for this record. But I don’t think they totally sold out, their ethos and lyrics kinda stayed the same. For marrying their dusty, oily hearts to the new-school sound of the 80’s in a successful fashion, I give this a light 4 outta 5 stars

Did I already listen to one Goldfrapp record on this list? Or was that on my own time? I look forward to more of this confusion as the daily album list goes on. Anyways, super pretty opening song. Mystical and peaceful guitar ballad. Turns out most of the record is like that! There’s a right amount of whimsy and vulnerability in here. “Eat Yourself” is probably my highlight, but if you need to skip to something more energetic then try “Caravan Girl.” Something so nice about this time/style of music - this, Florence + The Machine, Temper Trap, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, etc. - it was all very cathartic pop/alternative music.

I honestly really don’t have much for this record, since it didn’t give me much to chew on. Or at least there wasn’t much that I haven’t already hear before that was done better by other punk bands. I’m sure this could’ve been massive if you were a British teen in 1979, but I couldn’t connect the dots. 2/5.

There are moments, particularly early on, where we rise above the looming britpop slog that this record predates. Growing pains and angst can be felt throughout the first few tracks, whether it’s the jealous tone of the opening track, or the coming-of-age realizations in “The Marriage.” I personally love the surfer blues guitar riff and vocal melody on “Levi Stubbs Tears.” And that horn solo at the end? OOH! Love it. “Wishing The Days Away” is an equally wishful but gloomy singalong that I really enjoyed. “Deportees” is a highlight of disc 2, which is making a conscious effort to highlight social immigration and humanity issues at Americas southern border - it’s practically a protest song done in the Eagles lonesome western style.
Then, “The Clashing Of Ideaoligies” is making me wonder if someone isn’t pulling the switches on what albums we get on specific days for this list. The song is a scathing set of jabs about corruption in parliament and government in general. One day after our own inauguration? Hmmm.
Anyways. The good is really good, but this could probably be consolidated into one album to make it great. Instead, you’ve gotta take the good with the meh. Strong 3/5.

Nick Cave always has a lot of vivid stories to tell. I often wonder how he comes up with all these images in his head. This album is a good example of just that - from stories of family and relationships, to tales from high fantasy worlds - he has it all in his head.
At points during this record though, it felt like too much for one sitting. Not to take away from the incredible vocal conviction and great narrative-based lyricism. But towards the end I got a bit burnt out on it all.
“Hiding All Away” is a great anthemic rock song. And “Messiah Ward” has some really cool guitar harmonies that make it my favorite listen here. Soft 3/5

Man Ive always loved “You Can Call Me Al” so much. Maybe too much. Perhaps it’s because it kept playing in an ad for a while last July, perhaps I’m just chronically white. But that song is just a super ear worm and is complete fun.
I wasn’t aware that most all of this albums would be just as fun.
It seriously impresses me that Paul Simon was in the midst of a failing marriage, lost partnership with Art, and off the heels of a solo album that apparently flopped. I’d love to be 40 and find this much fun and inspiration from the world in the midst of such personal turmoil. I think he does the South African sound well and weaves in its native collaborators really nicely. The title track is such a good rambling road trip song with a memorable set of chords under its pre-chorus.
I was a little unsure about how this album would score for me as a whole, or if it would take a thematic turn, but when the first minute or so of “Diamonds On The Soles Of Her Shoes” finished up, I was just smiling ear to ear. How incredibly fun. I shouldn’t be shocked, but this little hymn was just gliding around in my head for hours after. At this point, I knew that the vibrancy and easy fun of this record was here to stay. I love art thats this kind to the senses, it’s like a little musical vacation. Paul Simon was in his bag for this one

Yeah so unfortunately the wiggling worm and dancing monkey in my brain ate this up like a steak dinner.

It’s so cool to me that last week I can be prompted to listen to some wildly over-produced Justin Timberlake debut solo album with every little note and production element perfectly placed, then yesterday listen to one of the most heartfelt and undervalued albums I’ve ever heard in American Gothic by David Ackles, then get this craziness today.
I can unfortunately see so many people responding to this with something along the lines of “ummmmm yeah not for me no thanks” and being very close-minded to it. I understand that perspective! But this is underniable a memorable listen. Furthermore, it’s both of its time, and ahead of its time! Social issues and late 60’s characters are portrayed well throughout the albums few structured moments. I hear some scathing and clever observations of societal injustices that remind me of System of a Down. I hear the frenetic sounds effects that remind me of Aphex Twin. I hear some beautiful instrumental bending amongst the chaos, like Miracle Musical. I hear LOTS of 100 Gecs in the pitched up vocals. I can even see the line between this and a very modern group like Deaths Dynamic Shroud and their off-the-wall sound.
“Flower Punk” and “What’s The Ugliest Part of Your Body” are my highlights, if you can pick out such things from this musical quilt.
The wiggling worn and the dancing monkey are telling me to give this 4 stars

Last week, I listened to Joni Mitchell’s “The Hissing Of Summer Lawns” where I said something to the effect of she and Billy Joel and Elton John may be in their own company when it comes to storytelling and lyrics that place you IN the song.
I would like to add David Ackles, or at least this album, to that elite company.

I was FLOORED listening to some of these songs. How have I never head of this guy, or this album? On here are some of the most beautiful songs I’ve ever heard, sung with a lot of conviction, and wrapped up in really pretty instrumental arrangements.

Right off the bat, “American Gothic” is such a fun parlor-style story of a messy couple. I didn’t realize I was in for such a theatrical listen!
Then “Love’s Enough” straightens things out with a Nick Drake type of love ballad. This song is so honest and heartfelt.
One of the most pure fun songs is “Oh California!” which switches into this swanky showtune style and ends with what seems to be a full string/horn chorus arrangement??? How many tricks does David Ackles have up his sleeve???
The last song that really stood out to me was “Waiting For the Moving Van” which just about brings you to your knees. What a sobering, sentimental little song.
In addition to these highlights, there’s bits of country, folk, and gospel peppered into things! Plus a very nice long story in the last song.
These are the albums that make this list so worthwhile. I can slog through 50 two-star albums in a row if it means the 51st album is this diamond in the rough. Total hidden gem that shines so bright if you give it a dusting.

Reading further on his life and legacy, it is a crime that David didn’t get the commercial success he deserved, even with Elton John constantly singing his praises. No popular interviews of him on youtube, very little info to dig into anywhere. This is insane!

Sounds like it’s just some white boys having fun. Strangely, the stuff I liked the most on this record were the stripped back, simple songs. The Going To California type of guitar melody on “Vastopol” was a very good interlude. Then “Liberty For Our Friend” was very fun and made its way into my head with its simplicity.
I’ve never heard about these guys before and don’t know how often I’ll hear about them after this. I can hear the foundations for some of the midwestern rock and emo to come after this album, like one of my favorites “You’d Prefer An Astronaut” by Hum.
While there is a great amount of charm to be heard throughout, I don’t think I’ll be going back to this one much. I’m happy I got to learn about a new band and had a bit of fun doing so