Reviews by mitch058

I really enjoyed hearing their debut album a while back in this collection, and I guess I thought this album would be more of the same, in a good way. And I guess it is, sort of, and I can see that this is considered a seminal album both for The Band and for rock music in general, but I found it really hard to get into it the way I did with "Music From Big Pink". There's no denying it has a lot of classic and revered songs, and it's all but impossible to avoid enjoying tracks like "Up on Cripple Creek", or appreciating the panoramic "The night they drive old Dixie down", but in the end it just didn't really click for me. A bummer, as I really enjoy and appreciate a lot of what Robbie Robertson has penned and composed, and The Band had a great cast of characters.

It's clearly me, not them, and thus I bow to the wisdom of decades of music critics and feel compelled to award four stars for its place in the pantheon.

I guess I must have been under a rock when this album came out, and all the hype about Jeff Buckley accompanied it (apparently to disappointment among some, adulation among others). I'm pretty sure I haven't heard anything from this album before, aside from perhaps his cover of "Hallelujah" (and while it's a very nice version of the song, it seems a bit ironic that he did a cover of John Cale's cover, not knowing that Leonard Cohen was the original author).

A fine album, I suppose, but I didn't find his crooning/wailing style all that...interesting? involving? not sure what exactly. I'm not sure if it's a production or mixing issue or his style, but it feels like the entire album is lacking depth or something similar to that: everything feels just kind of flat, coming at you from a long distance (ironic since he was such a small club player); the only real exceptions to that are "Hallelujah" and the weirdly almost-rocking "Eternal life", although even with a more full sound I still didn't really enjoy the latter.

I know we should give this project a pass on Christmas Day for whatever pops up, but this is pretty painful, and not just because Phil Spector was a creep and creepy guy and doesn't deserve any sort of accolades (especially given how dated his "wall of sound" seems these days). Moreover, I've really appreciated how strongly this collection has avoided "various artists"/"best of"/compilation albums, and this clearly violates that rule. I get it that it was a popular album back in the day, and I'm sure it was an interesting take on various Christmas songs, but it doesn't mean we have to like it. :)

What a strange album--or I guess I should say unexpected, but in a good way. I'm not sure I've ever heard of Lambchop, let alone heard any of their songs. Kurt Wagner's style and voice is vaguely reminiscent of the Magnetic Fields, or maybe the mellower sounds of Pulp, but not in an imitative way. I didn't listen as carefully to the lyrics as I probably should have, but I can tell there's a lot going on in the songs, and I enjoyed the experience overall. The only tracks that stood out were "You masculine you" (not a fan of the falsetto, although it's much more tolerable on the somewhat more hard-hitting "What else could it be?"), the video for "Up with people" (pretty much the only direct reference to Richard Nixon, and a super creepy mouth-overlay making it seem like Nixon was singing the song during some (presumably disastrous) press conference), and the darker and more rock-oriented end to the album with "The petrified florist" and "The butcher boy".

On the whole, I pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed the album as much as I did, despite what would otherwise seem *way* too far along the easy-listening spectrum than I'd prefer. (In that sense it reminds me of Ween's "country" album.)

I'm not sure exactly why I had become convinced that neither AC/DC nor this album specifically were present in the 1001-Albums project, but I'm very happy to discover that I was wrong. Even those among us who might not particularly enjoy AC/DC would likely have to acknowledge that this is definitely an album to hear before you die. I'm not really able to listen to this album with fresh ears, but I hope it sounds as distinctive and hard-hitting for those who've never heard this album before as it does to everyone else who couldn't possibly have avoided hearing many of their classics on the radio (or streaming for the younger fans). This album is jam-packed with so many of their classics, it's hard to believe that it's actually their 7th studio album.

One of the things that always confused me in my teenage years was how similar-sounding Brian Johnson tried to be to the recently deceased Bon Scott. Johnson never quite achieved the same unbelievably distinctive growl as Scott, but it's an impressive transition nonetheless. I suspect this album would have earned a full five stars if Bon Scott had been lead vocals, but it's still a fun album. And I'm kind of glad I never watched any of their videos back in the day, because they are one *homely* group of Aussies (well, Limeys and Aussies). The various stage videos from this album showcase how strangely disproportionate Malcolm Young is, with a small guy playing a *huge* guitar, and his younger brother Angus is of course renowned for goofy outfits and equally goofy head, while Brian Johnson's absurd newsboy-cap kind of completes the awkward rebel-schoolboy look. But they certainly knew how to rock.

Back in high school, I was always titillated by their name, but never really listened to them (outside of their brief appearance in the "Repo Man" soundtrack) and was pretty sure I wouldn't really enjoy an undistinguished SoCal punk band. (I didn't know until reading about the album that the frontman was formerly with Black Flag, but that doesn't really change much about my impressions or opinion, I'm afraid.)

This album confirms all of that, but I'm also very thankful and appreciative that we only got an EP sampling of them on this album. Nothing particularly interesting on the album, but it's hard to be particularly annoyed when no song lasts more than 90 seconds, so that helps them make the 3-star grade (that and the fact that this is the only Circle Jerks we have to listen to).

It's so impressive how different this Funkadelic album is from the other one in this collection ("One Nation Under A Groove"), or from the lone Parliament album too. I can definitely see why people have raved about Eddie Hazel's epic solo in the title track; I don't think I've ever heard his work before, and this is quite showcase for his endless riff. There are shades of Hendrix and also Jeff Beck in "Maggot brain", but nothing derivative, and a pleasure to listen to (especially with headphones). The rest of the album is somewhat more traditionally George Clinton oriented, albeit a lot darker than a lot of other George Clinton albums have been, and more rock-oriented too than other albums (I don't think I would have known "Super stupid" was by Funkadelic if it came on the radio). Despite the shadows, though, it's largely entertaining (although disappointing that "Wars of armageddon" wasn't an adequate bookend to the title track), and fun too to get Hot Buttered Soul providing backing vocals on "Can you get to that".

This is my first Metallica album from this collection, but the last of the collection's four Metallica albums, which is kind of a shame, as it's usually more interesting to listen to a band's evolution rather than devolution. But I'm also bummed to find out there are four Metallica albums at all in this collection, especially since they're all within 7 years of each other, and frankly they're not really known for having a lot of range in their music. I had a friend in high school that was a *big* fan of them, especially James Hetfield's furious rhythm guitar and Kirk Hammett's blistering solos, but even he had kind of moved on from Metallica by "...And Justice for All" (three years earlier than this album), and I had never matched his interest or passion the whole time. I also developed a serious dislike of Metallica when they became the face of all the Napster-related lawsuits, even if they themselves didn't actually sue anyone.

Regardless, this is certainly a very solid Metallica album, and possibly their finest. It certainly has a *lot* of their most enduring hits, and it still keeps enough elements of their earlier thrash style to avoid seeming like a transition to a more "friendly" style (although my friend undoubtedly would have vehemently disagreed, if he'd even cared by that point). I'd never seen the videos to their singles form this album, and a couple of them--"Enter Sandman" and "The Unforgiven"--are definitely worth watching, although I'm not sure they help clarify whatever it is that Hetfield and Ulrich were trying to convey. That kind of applies to all of their songs, not just on this album but in general: I don't think they're nearly as insightful or profound as they think they are (not to mention as intelligible as they might have thought they were). And a number of tracks on this album feel a bit recycled, sadly (e.g. "Don't tread on me" sounds a lot like their earlier "Master of puppets"). But this is still a great exemplar of Metallica; and it probably should have been the only Metallica album in this collection (although I would have been very bummed not to get to hear "Fade to black" again as part of this project).

Hm, not sure I've ever heard of The Libertines before, and I don't think I've heard anything from this album on the radio either. The opening track initially sounded a bit like they'd stolen U2's The Edge for their garage band, but then the opening lyrics made me panic that somehow this was a Morrissey/Cure/Smiths knockoff band. It doesn't appear that any of that is the case, but it does suggest that they struggle to distinguish themselves, at least in my ears (later on there's even shades of Pulp and maybe some Clash too). An OK album, I guess, but nothing particularly struck me as especially interesting, entertaining or distinctive (The retro "What Katie did" was probably the best of the lot).

Honestly, I'm not even sure it warrants the 2005 BBC poll ranking of third most overrated album ever, although I guess my ignorance of them wasn't shared broadly then or now. I'm grateful, though, that this is the only album by them in this collection, and not at all surprised to discover that their lone entry in the book didn't last very long after the first edition.

I haven't listened much to Bob Marley's music beyond what plays on the radio, so I don't know his discography well, but this certainly seems like a great showcase for Marley's songs and stylings. There are of course the massively famous singles on this album--curiously, all on the B side where the focus is more on love and spirituality--but I really enjoyed a number of other songs, especially the more political A side ones; "Natural Mystic", "Guiltiness" and the slow burn of "Exodus" are all interesting songs. There's something about the A side of the album that makes me think of a fascinating but fairly obscure movie I saw quite a while back, "Burn!" (from 1966, and starring Marlon Brando during his more politically active period).

What a strong album, and a fun listening experience.

I've only previously heard their radio hits, so I know it's not necessarily a representative sample of their sound, but from that exposure I haven't formed a very positive association of Coldplay. And now, after hearing this album (plus knowing that I have their debut album in store at some point down the road in this collection), I'm not sure my opinion has changed much. For good or bad (and in my case mainly bad), Chris Martin's warbling/keening style kind of dominates the experience of listening to a Coldplay song, and it seems like almost every single one of their songs is somehow THE MOST IMPORTANT EMOTION AND CONCEPT YOU WILL HEAR, even though I can't usually understand what he's singing over the wall of symphonic and urgently authentic music. It's likely my prejudice against them more than anything else that makes me cringe when I hear a Coldplay song, and feel like they're just trying *way* too hard to sound like they're the most emotionally attuned band on the planet. And the videos for their singles don't really add (or subtract) to this impression, sadly; well, except for the surprisingly dark video for "God put a smile on your face", which didn't seem to have anything to do with the song but had a great (dis)appearance by Paddy Considine.

I wondered if and when we might get this album, and here it is almost exactly a third of the way through. I own this album, and remember when you couldn't avoid hearing it everywhere and everywhen, yet listening to it now I kind of wonder why it made such a big splash (only now, after reading the Wikipedia entry, do I understand that the splash came more from Moby commercially licensing every track of the album than radio plays). I enjoyed listening to it again, and there's a kind of entirety to the album that I find really satisfying, but it's also not really earth-shattering or novel or anything, beyond perhaps using those Alan Lomax samples in a clever way. I feel about this album much like I feel about Faithless' "Sunday 8PM" album.

I'd never seen the videos to any of the tracks, so that was an interesting experience. I'm not sure the videos added much of anything to the songs; "Honey" had a strange sort of multiple incarnation puzzle/mystery to it (but I don't understand how it was at all related to the song), "Find my baby" was neither clever nor interesting, "Porcelain" was kind of interesting with the eyeballs, "Why does my heart feel so bad?" reminded me a bit of Radiohead's "Paranoid android" animated video, "Natural blues" was not nearly as profound as I suspect he thought it was (and disappointingly one-dimensional in equating old age with decrepitude), and "Run on" has a cute sort of Memento-style unraveling mystery to it. My favorites on this album remain "Why does my heart feel so bad?", "South side", "Natural blues" (despite the video), "Run on", and "Everloving".

I'm both impressed and a little disappointed that this is the only Moby album in this collection, as it would have been nice to have had his album "Animal Rights" as an interesting contrast. But I like the idea that we're getting just one album from an artist, and this is a good one, so a star boost for that (to help offset how it's clearly too long an album). And very cool that Moby is a direct descendant of Herman Melville!

I really appreciated getting Pere Ubu's debut album earlier in this collection, in part because of the unique sound and out-there-ness. I was also perfectly happy to have that one album as my sole exposure to them; I wish we could have been given a choice as to whether we wanted *more* of their avant-garage weirdness, or some artist/band that *isn't* in this collection but should be (that list is sadly quite long), as I would have eagerly chosen the latter choice. But "Dub Housing" it is. Boo, 1001 albums!

Much like their first album, it's an interesting experiment but I'm not sure any particular track really stood out. "On the surface" is kind of catchy (very mildly so), and there's something a bit compelling to the refrain in "Caligari's mirror". Even though the music is quite different stylistically, I was particularly reminded of the band Colonel Bruce Hampton and the Aquarium Rescue Unit (maybe just the same sort of experimental noodling).

I don't think there's any good reason to give them only two stars, except to balance out the four stars I gave them for their debut album, back when I didn't realize there was more Pere Ubu ahead of us. But that's not really fair to this album, I suppose, even if it doesn't really seem to add anything distinctive compared to their first album (although the "1001 Albums" review seems to suggest this album took a radically different turn, I must admit I didn't hear it).

Well, I'll admit I've never heard of Lupe Fiasco, and have no idea if he's a big name or not in the hip-hop world (either in 2006 or in 2024). I'm not sure why nearly every hip-hop album we've gotten in this collection is an hour long or longer, but it's kind of a bummer as few artists of any genre are able to fill an hour or more with solid tracks and no filler. And this album is no exception, sadly, despite the "1001 Albums" book's description of it as "57 minutes of non-stop funtasia", and despite as well his interesting/unusual Muslim background, it's not particularly distinctive or original-sounding for the most part. I enjoyed a cluster of tracks relatively early on--the single "Kick, push" (and also the later "Kick, push II", even though both of them kind of reminded me of Kid Rock's "Black chick, white guy" for some reason), then "I gotcha" and "The instrumental"--but then it fizzled out again for me for much of the rest of the album, with a couple of exceptions for "Daydreamin'" (a remarkable Inception-style set of layered samples/covers of "Daydream" by The Wallace Collection/Gunter Kallmann Choir/I monster (with a nod to Beta Band too)) and the unexpected depth to "American terrorist". Some interesting samples throughout too.

I'll admit I'm extremely unlikely to listen to this album again, nor other albums by him. And a bummer that the Wikipedia entry is so underwhelming and strangely plodding, as it could have made the album more interesting, honestly.

I've come to realize that I'm not all that much of a Stevie Wonder fan, despite wanting to be, and while that's kind of disappointing, I *do* appreciate that this project helped me realize this. There's certainly nothing wrong with this album, and despite that this came in the middle of his rapid-fire album releases, it's got a nice and somewhat distinctive groove to it (and I had no idea that he got in a serious car accident just after it got released, nor that this experience made him even more spiritual).

But I'm not sure if it's simply from already listening to three other Stevie Wonder albums in this collection already, or the heavy (and impressively early) synthesizer layer, or just something...missing...from his almost-funk sound, or something that just makes the album kind of bland to me. My favorites were probably the classic "Higher ground" (I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I kind of prefer the Red Hot Chili Peppers' cover version to the original), and the surprisingly stark "Living for the city". I also enjoyed the opening to "Don't you worry 'bout a thing", and I can totally see how Barbra Streisand made "All in love is fair" into her standard (although I'm not a big fan of either version).

Well, much like "69 Love Songs" this "album" definitely pushes the boundaries of my tolerance and willingness to listen through without giving up. And a shame, too, given that this is really two very different albums, with "The Love Below" more interesting musically and "Speakerboxxx" *much* more interesting lyrically. But I'm sure there are going to be more of these outliers, so at least this one's behind me. I'm not really familiar with Outkast or their solo artists (although I've definitely heard both "The way you move" and "Hey ya!" a *lot* on the radio long ago), so I don't have a sense how different this is than their previous music (and interesting that it seems this was effectively their last album given all the accolades).

"Speakerboxxx" is an intriguing album, largely because it becomes more interesting as you get further into it. It's well-produced, and an impressive range of topics that extend well beyond sex, drugs, violence and self-promotion. After hearing the whole "album", though, I'm not sure I could really identify a lot of specific tracks to call out. I did enjoy the FedUp-driver video for "GhettoMusick" (and kind of wondered just how boring that song would be without the video playing too), as well the Stevie-Wonder-esque "Church" and "Knowing".

I can certainly see why some people describe "The Love Below" as a long-lost Prince album (although there are aspects of Parliament too). It's definitely a weird contrast to "Speakerboxxx", and entertaining in its own offbeat way, although I'm not sure it would have fared all that well as its own album. But then of course there's those somewhat few and far between hits on the album that seem almost out of place, like "Hey ya!" (and its incredible flamboyant video) and "Prototype" (although I'm not sure it made it far as a single), and a few other songs that are entertaining in a somewhat superficial way (like "Happy Valentine's Day" and "Behold a lady" and "Dracula's wedding" (with a great lyric video)). But you have to give him credit for putting it all out there.

If this "album" was under an hour, I might have boosted its rating. But 2-1/4 hours is *way* too much for anyone but a rabid fan.

It's kind of a bummer that this is the only Otis Redding album we get in this collection, but an excellent selection nonetheless. I've never listened to a full album by him, so it's nice to get a full half-hour of his distinctive sound and voice. It's also interesting to find out that most of the songs on this album are covers, and somewhat ironic that one of the few Redding-authored songs on the album, "Respect", became *much* more famous and well-known by Aretha Franklin's cover version. And in a truly bizarre moment of coincidence/synchronicity, I literally read a local newspaper article this morning (12/11/2024) about Sam Cooke's now-60-years-old song "Change gonna come" and how Cooke drafted the first version of the song during a visit to Durham, NC, just after meeting with NCCU students; I think I prefer Cooke's version of the song (the same with "Wonderful world"), but Redding's is good too. (And very sad that this album came out just months after Sam Cooke's murder.)

A nice album to fill your soul cup, and amazing that it took him and the backing band only about 28 hours to record the whole album.

Kind of remarkable to think that earlier this year (July 2024, "The Death of Slim Shady") Eminem just released a coda to Slim Shady 25 years after this album came out. It's never been the most elevated concept, but you gotta hand it to Enimem for the longevity of this pathetic "alter-ego" figure. And even though it's a pretty uneven album, there's something about it that I've always enjoyed listening to, and in a weird way it's held up much better than some of the other rap/hip-hop albums in this collection. My favorites are probably "Guilty conscience", "If I had", the genuinely disturbing "97 Bonnie & Clyde" and "Rock bottom", but most of the tracks are fun to revisit. (I suspect that some of the tolerance I feel for this album is because it's not as focused on drugs, gangs and (realistic) violence as some others, although that guy has a serious mouth and Slim Shady certainly (and likely Eminem too) has some serious issues with women.) I know a lot of people find his voice's tone/timbre super annoying, but I'm thankful that I don't suffer from this.

I wondered when we'd get this album, so the wait is over. I've never been a huge Springsteen fan (of his music, that is, as I really respect his career and perspectives), but it's hard to ignore how iconic this album has been for him. It's also remarkable how familiar so many songs on this album are--I think the only ones I didn't recognize were "Backstreets" and "Meeting across the river" (although the familiar-sounding-ness could also be because he doesn't have the biggest range). It's also interesting to read that Springsteen agonized over the production of this album, requiring many many (many) takes to get everything to sound just right, given that he's a notorious lyric mumbler and it appears *nobody* really knows whether Mary's dress sways or waves....

I kind of wish I didn't have 4 more Springsteen ahead of me in this collection, but it's hard to fault the inclusion of this one.

At first I wondered if I'd ever heard anything by The Waterboys, but then the opening track made me realize I'd definitely heard them (or at the very least I've heard a rendition of "Fisherman's blues" that sounds almost exactly like their version...). It's kind of all over the place musically, which is sort of intriguing, but also a bit scattered-sounding; I do like how there's a bit of The Pogues going on at times in this album, though, and they do a very nice cover of Van Morrison's "Sweet thing". I also like it that "And a bang on the ear" failed to chart in part because everyone from outside Ireland didn't know what that phrase meant (myself included until I read the Wikipedia entry). I'm not sure that Yeats would necessarily have enjoyed their rendition of "The stolen child", sadly. (I certainly didn't, and it made me think of more painful aspects of ELP or Spinal Tap.)

Based on this album, it seems like The Waterboys would have fit right in at the 1986 Self-Aid charity concert, but sadly didn't. Overall it's not the most exciting collection of songs, and since we don't get any other Waterboys albums in this collection (not that I'm complaining), and I don't know their music well or at all, it's hard to get a sense of how radical a departure this album was from previous albums. OK but not great I'd say.