Reviews by littlestlassloves

Knew the artist name but had never knowingly listened to anything by them.

Very floaty vocal and fuzzy loud guitar: I thought, in the right mood, I could potentially like it, but I was clearly not in the right mood as I listened to the first 1 and a half tracks and then abandoned the whole album until the next day.

24 hours later and I don't like it any better. Only Tomorrow seems long and plodding with not enough ideas for its runtime. Then Who Sees You did basically the same thing. They seem to enjoy bending notes in a way that makes it sound like you're listening to it on faulty turntable that's struggling to run at a consistent speed.

I abandoned any attempt to comment individually on specific tracks at this point, because they pretty much all sounded the same to me (though I didn't totally hate New You). In general, the longer it went on, the more bored I became.

I was unsurprised to learn it was in the 2014 version of the book, but then got removed by later revisions. It's not as dreadful as other albums I've given a 1 star to, but 2 stars would be laughable, so:

1/5

Extremely boring review time: I have no strong feelings either way about this album. It was perfectly pleasant and I enjoyed listening to it while it was happening, but I can't see me ever returning to it.

3/5

Oh that is a lot of The Who in one go. I generally like the *idea* of The Who much more than the reality. And this is The Who with ad breaks. Two tracks in and I was thinking you could already knock 5 minutes off the run time by eliminating both of them.

I am grateful at this point to have read Wikipedia and discovered the album was actually originally 39 minutes and not the 71 minutes Amazon was offering (or the 5 hours 41 minutes of the super deluxe version!).

I liked Odorono despite the fact it was about deodorant. And I liked I Can See for Miles. Ultimately the concept annoyed me so much it was hard to see past it to judge the songs however.

2/5

It seems we're never too far away from 'albums my parents played a ton when I was a kid' during this project. This is one I remember pretty well compared to many others though.

I think there are some truly great rock songs on this album. I haven't listened to it in probably 25 years, but I remembered so many of the lyrics and was tapping my foot the whole way through. I even quite like the ballad Why Worry despite it being three times longer than it needs to be.

Away from the singles (all of which are great) I think I like The Man's Too Strong best due to the whole 'quiet, quiet, LOUD, quiet, quiet' thing it's got going on.

Thinking about the score for this I found it really hard to pick between a 4 and a 5, at least partially because the singles are such standout tracks that it's difficult for the rest to compete. On balance I think I'm settling on a:

4/5

It was a massive relief to see this pop up. Mostly because I started doing the 1001 Album Generator by myself and created a group after about 4 albums. I've been worrying for about a year that I accidentally set it up wrong and the rest of the group was never going to listen to, for example, another Bowie album I hated. But Queen II reappearing means success!

I could listen to Freddie sing anything and have a reasonably good time. He had a great voice and the band as whole made the most beautiful vocal arrangements. The songs other band members take the lead on lack the magic a bit for me - I end up just waiting around for Freddie - so the a-side of this album is not my favourite.

This is Queen being a bit Led Zeppelin, a bit prog, far less glorious-rock-pop than the sound that made them legends. That being said I do like the b-side quite a lot. I think this really should be a 3.5 for me but Funny How Love Is is bumping it up to a 4 (its Beach Boysesque sound is lovely).

4/5

Some songs have reached the level of fame and recognition that I find it weird to think they were once just a track written to go on an artist's 12th album. There was a world, not even that long ago comparatively, where the song Lets Get It On didn't exist! Bizarre to compute.

The fact there's a reprise (Keep Getting It On) half way through the album could be seen as a little lazy on a 33 minute album, but the chutzpah of it made me laugh out loud, so I'm giving it a pass.

It's all great. It's all very soulful. It's all very much intented to be consumed in a very specific setting (and so is a little odd if you are actually just drinking a massive cup of tea and eating your breakfast like I was while listening to it).

I liked What's Going On better as an album, but did I like it a whole star better? Not really, but as it can't get a 4.5, it's gonna have to be a:

4/5

I enjoyed this quite a lot. At one point I was even making a cup of tea, bobbing and swaying to the rhythm in the kitchen. It did help the I really like a different cover of I've Got My Mojo Working by Kitty, Daisy & Lewis, although to be fair, despite the fact I love that song, I didn't really need to hear it twice in a row - that was a bizarre choice.

We've had a few live albums now, and I think I'm still standing by the opinion that I'd rather hear a studio version of the same songs than a live one on a project like this. That being said, these are some skilled musicians and the live setting shows that off.

Extremely pleasant music to tap your foot to that I want to give 3.5, but I am going to round up as I like it more than a 3

4/5

I did not enjoy the experience of listening to this at all. Hedphelym in particular made me feel really anxious and I genuinely considered bailing out, but I'm 335 albums in and haven't quit an album yet (even Trout Mask Replica!) so I'm not going to let Aphex Twin defeat me. I am clearly a glutton for punishment.

I do not "get" ambient music and I certainly didn't enjoy this.

1/5

I definitely thought I'd never heard of this band until track 2 started.

This is another case of really quite liking the instrumental and backing vocals but despising the lead vocalist's voice. He sounds like he's trying to combine Mick Jagger and Lou Reed while sounding like he'd rather be doing literally anything other than singing these songs.

4/5 for the music.
0/5 for the lead vocals.

2/5 will have to do

Another band plucked from my parent's record collection.

I like the stacked backing vocals. I like the brass. I like the piano. In places the vocals made me think of Rod Stewart for some reason. East St. Louis Toodle-Oo feels like a completely out of place cover (although I liked it).

I think as a whole I enjoyed it, but it didn't set my world alight. Another 2.5/5 if I could half star it, but as I can't:

3/5

Time After Time is one of the greatest songs of the 80s. It is a far better composed song than Girls Just Wanna Have Fun in my opinion, and that makes it so much more enjoyable to me than anything else on this album. Cyndi's voice is frequently screechy and not always particularly tuneful, but man, her singing on Time After Time is just fabulous.

This album is so, so, so, so 80s, which honestly I don't mind at all, but no one could ever be surprised at what decade created this. I also have to praise the genius mind that came up with "I bop you bop a they bop, Be bop be bop a lu bop, I hope he will understand" as a lyric. Comedy gold.

I think this should be a 2.5 but is getting a:

2/5

(But 5/5 for Time After Time)

Second Public Enemy album during this project and another album where I got to enjoy playing spot the sample. I particularly enjoyed Fame by Bowie, the Flash Gordon theme and Son of Shaft turning up. And the intro being from a BBC DJ was a surprise. And sampling Slayer! I keep saying it, but sampling is such an impressive skill to me - creating a completely new thing from disparate scraps of other songs and it sounding like it always should have been like that.

I really appreciate the topics and Chuck D's style of rapping too. As a whole, I think I liked it a tiny bit less than Fear Of A Black Planet, but it's still very much worth:

3/5

I have very little to say about this. I enjoyed it as background music and for some weird reason it reminded me of the theme tune to Roseanne.

Should be a 2.5, will get:

3/5

I do not have a great hit rate with Bowie albums: so far there's been two 1*, one 2* and one 3* which has really shaken my confidence in the artists I thought I liked. This album involves Changes, Oh! You Pretty Things and Life On Mars however, so is already out of the 1* or 2* danger zone.

I like this piano-heavy, poppier version of Bowie. Kooks is great, as is Andy Warhol. And it's funny! Plus, while I've never been the biggest Yes fan, whenever he turns up on other records I get why people think Rick Wakeman is great (the piano on this record is lovely).

Even on an album which includes two singles that aren't just famous Bowie singles, they're some of the most popular songs in the western world, the album tracks are (pretty much) all really enjoyable. Plus it's tight run time means nothing sticks around too long to get annoying.

Maybe I do like Bowie albums?

4/5

Johnny Cash really does find himself very funny doesn't he?

I liked the guitar, thought the vocal performance was variable and the lyrical content was (in some cases) questionable. The actual set up of the live album was absolutely fascinating though, and it likely deserves it's place on the list solely on principle.

Ultimately while I quite enjoyed listening to it, I can't see me ever listening to it again, but would happily listen to a studio album. It would be a 2.5, but:

3/5 for the sheer ballsiness of the idea.

First two tracks I really loved and I figured this was definitely in line for a 4 or 5 but then You Shook Me started.

The most plodding 5 bar blues ever. It was so so so slow. I debated what it would sound like if the speed was doubled - I think it would improve it, especially as it would mean it wasn't so fecking long.

After that I intermittently enjoyed and was ambivalent towards tracks. There were some definite high points for me - Your Time Is Gonna Come and How Many More Times were enjoyable from the second half of the album.

I love the vocals and they're clearly skilled musicians but You Shook Me annoyed me so much though, there's no way I could ever give it more than:

3/5

Track one is like a madman has been let loose in the BBC Sound Effects Archive, got over excited and tried to use at least one effect from every category of noise. It was a sensible song length, if not a sensible song, and I didn't hate it.

Track two, being over 13 minutes started slowly, before the weird vocals and dog barking sound effects reappeared. It was, to put it mildly too fucking long to be that fucking weird.

Track three, "short" at only 6:20 was also weird. But also with sort of South Asian vocals and African inspired instrumentals. I started to long for the traffic noises to return because at least then something would happen.

Finally track four, the real endurance test at over 15 minutes. It was one of those songs where every instrument sounded like it was trying to play a different track. While a wavery voice sang "to whooooooom it may concern" over the top. I got fed up with it around a quarter of the way in.

Really, really, really weird, but I didn't hate all of it, so:

2/5

I really do try to separate art from artist when listening to these albums (although once again, fuck you, Brian Warner). Kanye, though? That's a tough one...

...thankfully for the bit of my brain that wants to instantly give the dickhead a 1/5, there's plenty for me to dislike. For a start, I don't much like his voice or flow while rapping and I genuinely cannot stand his singing voice. He's comically poor when trying to be melodic.

Some of the tracks also do not even slightly justify their running time. The multiple circa 6 minute tracks rarely had enough ideas to support that. I hate skits and despite not generally disliking Chris Rock, I despised his nonsense on this album.

I didn't mind a few of the tracks, I strangely liked Nicki Minaj's contribution (despite her also being an extremely problematic individual) and I like a fair few of the actual beats but all in all, I don't understand why this gets such praise. Even pre-Nazification Kanye wouldn't be something I'd want to listen to judging by this record.

1/5 for the human being
2/5 for the record (and that's generous)

I really enjoyed this. I still have zero interest in skits and would absolutely always pick a shorter, skitless version of an album but this era of hip hop just scratches a certain itch. The samples, the groove to it, the rhythm: it's a great sound.

Lyrics wise we're back to pretty standard topics of this genre, plus Ice Cube arguing he's not anti-semitic. I was hugely pleased to learn that this album is widely praised for popularising the phrase "It's on like Donkey Kong" though.

I had a great time listening to it and particularly enjoyed the moment where, mid song, I took in an Ocado food delivery. The delivery driver certainly seemed surprised. I'm clearly too white and middle class for this record, but screw it...

4/5

In a move that would horrify my Pixies loving partner of 20 years if I were to tell him, which I won't, I am fairly indifferent to the Pixies. I really like Here Comes Your Man, and enjoy a number of other tracks, but in general I find it hard to get too excited about them.

To my ears, this was perfectly fine. Not poor, not great. Good.

3/5