Reviews by mondo-kun

Oh, the trend of the times when an artist was simply a singing head, performing what others had written before them.

On this album, The Rolling Stones for the first time abandoned this vicious practice — all the songs here are written by the Jagger / Richards duo, with only the influence of old blues standards remaining, heavily diluted by sitar, marimba, and harmonica, unusual for the genre.

Did the band succeed? At first, it certainly did; the entire first half of the album, ending with the epochal jam "Going Home," is excellent. The second half stumbled and then completely lost its way; these aren't exactly bad songs, they're just boring, especially considering the band's current stature.

After listening to the album, the initial confusion over the fact that four tracks were cut from the American version dissipates; but they added Paint It Black - that's what I call an equal exchange.

The 1950s and 1960s were truly amazing: if you had a pleasant voice, you didn't have to write songs; just cover other people's hits, make money, and have fun.

That's how Scott Walker's second album works, too, with only a third of its songs composed by him. The remaining two-thirds are versions of hits by Belgian Jacques Brel and covers of other popular artists of the time, as well as soundtracks. However, almost every one of these songs, with their sometimes pompous, sometimes airy arrangements centered around a pop baritone, would fit right in with a romantic film.

Walker translated and covered Brel superbly, and his own work is also quite good here, but the rest is rather mournful. In any case, if you're interested in fantasizing about what would have happened if Nick Cave sang in The Last Shadow Puppets (and the lyrics are downright Cave-esque in places), this record is probably the closest in spirit.

In 1975, the low-budget film "That's the Way of the World" was released. It predictably flopped at the box office and unexpectedly propelled Earth, Wind & Fire, the creators of the eponymous soundtrack, to the top of the charts.

The film, however, is completely unnecessary to understand this album: it's classic funk-soul, performed by nine members on a variety of instruments, including some quite exotic ones. It's also a story of hard work — Earth, Wind & Fire had previously released five unsuccessful albums, but they didn't give up and, with their characteristic joy, continued to move forward, and they were rewarded for it.

The album dips slightly midway through the album, when the obligatory "Ballads" section begins, but everything else is sound so technically well and sung so positively that a three-star rating would definitely be too low.

If I had to choose a synonym for the word "style" in music, it would definitely be Duran Duran.

Forty years later, their second album has only just begun to mature, and everything about it is still stylish: the cover art, the jagged riffs, the superb rhythm section (surprisingly, all three members with the last name Taylor are not related), the recognizable (though not the strongest) vocals, the videos filmed for the nascent MTV era... And what a saxophone solo in the song of the same name!

Listening to this record makes you want to put on your best suit, take a beautiful woman by the arm, stroll along the embankment at sunset with her, and end the evening in a nightclub... Which these songs would also be perfect for! It's rock, pop, disco, and new wave all at once — the album excels in every genre it explores.

And that's why Duran Duran is loved by so many different people - from Princess Diana to Jonathan Davis, and of course, me.

Pantera is a perfect example of the phrase "rags to riches." With just one release, four Texas rednecks transformed themselves from mediocre glam losers into cowboys from hell, energizing a crowd of hundreds of thousands at Moscow's Tushino Airfield like an atomic bomb. After that, there was no slowing down, so the band decided to record the heaviest album possible.

And they did! "The guitar should sound like a circular saw, the drums should pound your ears," said drummer Vinnie Paul. And that's exactly what happened, along with pulsating bass and Phil Anselmo's barking vocals. Every musician gave it their all; every song, be it the hurricane-force "Fucking Hostile," the measured "Walk," or the ballad "This Love," simultaneously feels like a punch in the face from the album cover and makes you want to give it to someone yourself.

Taking one star off because the record becomes rather monotonous toward the end. Such energy needs to be carefully measured.

One could, of course, begin a discussion of this album by listing the musicians Thundercat has worked with, but for me, such approaches immediately make me think, "The session member has decided to go solo, nothing interesting."

Let's just say that Thundercat is, first and foremost, a very skilled bassist, and in this regard, he truly shines here. Unfortunately, he's not as good a singer, and his falsetto becomes tiresome after the album's midpoint.

Most of the album is based on standard modern R&B, but occasionally a whole host of genres breaks through: prog, soft rock, jazz, hip-hop, not to mention the related funk and soul. It sounds like something abstruse, but it's actually easy to listen to. The variety of guests here matches the genres: from Kendrick Lamar and Wiz Khalifa to Pharrell and, surprisingly, Kenny Loggins.

But twenty-three songs, even though they are short, are still a bit too many.

In the late 1980s, synth-pop and hairy metal ruled the radio, so it's logical that many producers turned down Tracy Chapman's requests to record her quiet, semi-acoustic debut.

Whoever took on this venture struck it big – the singer's simple, soft folk ballads about love, dreams of a better life, and social issues resonated so deeply with people that the album remains one of the best-sellers of all time. It all sounds truly pleasant, though Tracy's vocals are a bit peculiar, and if you don't like them, you'll likely tire of them by the middle.

Yes, in places the lyrics contain completely naive, leftist messages, based on the juxtaposition of rich and poor and black and white. On the other hand, the artist was 24 years old when the album was released. At that age, you can still fight for all that's good against all that's bad.

As they say, you're judged by your clothes, and in this case, by your cover... Oh dear, what are those nostrils against the sunset? It looks like a cross between a postcard from a resort and a still from the end of some Korean drama series.

But what's inside the album? Nearly forty minutes of beautiful acoustic music, in its own way, from David Crosby, best known for his supergroup Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Although everything here starts off relaxed, by the middle of the listen a melancholy feeling begins to overwhelm, and at the end, some kind of church hymn suddenly appears.

Old acquaintances Graham Nash and Neil Young also contributed to Crosby's work on this album; just as members of the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and Santana. All in all, the amount of smoke in the studio is understandable, and since this album took second place on the Vatican newspaper's list of the best releases, perhaps the Pope himself was getting high to it.

R.E.M. is often compared to U2 in various music articles and on streaming services under the "Similar Artists" tab. I'm fine with U2, but this comparison is too flattering for the Irish.

R.E.M. is much more elegant; their lyrics occasionally include political messages, but they don't hit you so hard. Their early albums were somewhat chaotic, but on Green, their major-label debut, the band found their energetic yet melancholy sound. Around this time, R.E.M.'s concerts began selling out arenas, leading longtime fans to accuse the band of selling out; in my opinion, this is unfounded. It's just that their multi-layered lyrics and slightly enigmatic music have somehow resonated with many.

It was also here that guitarist Peter Buck first picked up the mandolin, which three years later would become the backbone of the band's biggest hit, but that album isn't on the list.

When I worked at a concert venue, we often hosted Latin American parties where girls looking pretty much like the one on this album cover would sway their hips, arms, and breasts for hours to songs like the ones I heard here. This record is perfect for that kind of entertainment.

It's hard to enjoy listening to it in any other setting. Firstly, every song sounds like the same thing — it's exactly what you imagine when you hear the phrase "Caribbean music". Secondly, you really can't imagine what to do with this music outside of dancing: maybe sipping Cuba Libre, but then again, I'd prefer to do that while lying under a palm tree, which isn't always within reach.

That said, it's all well-recorded, and Tito Puente is a recognized master of the genre, and his musicians are no slouch, but I quickly grew tired of the album. Perhaps I'll have to listen to it again during a beach vacation.

PJ Harvey's music has never been particularly close to me (so much so that I walked out of her last show in my city), so I listened to this album, considered by many to be her most important, in its entirety for the first time.

There was no fireworks display of emotion: it's simply solid alternative rock, sometimes measured, sometimes energetic. There are a couple of hits, and it was a pleasure to listen to. The main drawback is that when Polly switches to a high-pitched voice (let's be honest, it's almost a screech), you really want to turn the record off; fortunately, such moments are few and far between.

One journalist disagrees with me, however, and considers the album's only drawback the presence of Thom Yorke — on three songs! It's laughable until you try to imagine his vocals on the other tracks and catch yourself thinking the album sounds like early Radiohead. Let everyone decide for themselves whether that's a good thing or a bad thing.

James Murphy, the driving force behind LCD Soundsystem, once told journalists, "Writing about us isn't hard... Just use words like 'unlikely frontman,' 'bear-like,' 'unshaven,' 'Talking Heads,' blah blah blah"

Indeed, looking at this disheveled man, the last thing you'd think is that he's a key figure in the indie sleaze movement, the 2000s' punk-electronic sound. Yet, it was his debut album that took New York dance floors by storm in 2005. On Sound of Silver, he further refined his style, while also making nods to Kraftwerk and, of course, Talking Heads.

This energetic music, which makes you want to run somewhere, is surprisingly combined with lyrics about relationships, thoughts on aging, and the melancholy of the big city — in fact, these are precisely the topics that conversation turns to when the sun breaks on the dance floor.

In 2014, I went to a festival where Paul Weller performed. Out of habit, I decided to listen to some of his discography before the concert, and I didn't understand his music at all. I barely remember the concert either, so when I saw this album today, I automatically expected an hour of something lackluster.

But the album turned out to be very good! There's nothing here from Weller's native The Jam, of course, but it does have what I'd call "proto-Britpop" — melodic, often semi-acoustic songs imbued with the atmosphere of 1960s England, yet still freshly listenable today. Everything sounds calm, but not depressing; melancholic in places, but not oppressive. The record is superbly recorded and mixed; the hour flew by, even with a few instrumentals and occasional two-minute outros.

If you enjoy the Noel Gallagher side of Oasis, then Wild Wood is definitely worth checking out.

There are albums that are best listened to in their entirety, there are those that should be listened to in their entirety, and then there are those that must be listened to in their entirety.

Tommy falls into the latter category. One of the first (or second, depending on your perspective) rock operas, it was written almost entirely by the band's guitarist, Pete Townshend. It's a seventy-five-minute classic rock epic, where the songs, like chapters in a book, flow into each other almost seamlessly — from half-minute interludes to long overtures.

The plot isn't exactly easy to follow. It's clear that it's about a deaf, dumb and blind man who eventually becomes a religious guru, but the record benefited greatly from Townshend himself describing the entire ten-page script in an interview with Rolling Stone before its release.

The album's main drawback is that it could have been about fifteen minutes shorter. However, that's not a huge deal.

For anyone who logically assumed this was Scott Walker's fourth solo album, I hasten to disappoint you — it's his fifth. The oddities don't end there.

Listeners and critics of the late 1960s misunderstood the juxtaposition of a pop baritone with lush, cinematic orchestral arrangements and ignored the album to such an extent that the label decided not to reprint it (the first reissue wouldn't be released until 1992).

Yet the record still managed to reach the right audience, as echoes of its mysterious atmosphere can be felt in Pulp, Suede and Nick Cave, as well as in some works by Alex Turner and Brendon Urie.

Walker, however, continued to pursue increasingly avant-garde experiments right up until the very end, beating raw meat with a hammer and clanking machete blades during studio recordings, and even released a collaborative album with Sunn O))). However, that's another topic.

While King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard were just warming up, White Denim were already in full swing!

Honestly, it's surprising they didn't experience the same wave of popularity — their music is very similar in places. Perhaps the reason is it's the purely American school of jam rock, a genre known for its lengthy improvisations that aren't everyone's cup of tea.

The album, however, doesn't feature any overly long songs, but the spirit of, say, the Grateful Dead is fully present. It feels like at times they've mashed up all sorts of genres in a single song: a jazz guitar part transitions into a progressive riff, the drums suddenly leap into a high-speed psychedelic rock fill every now and then, and the bass seems to float through the entire album, sometimes diving deep, sometimes overshadowing everything else.

An interesting sense of madness, but madness with mathematical order.

By industry standards, Steve Earle took a long time to get going — despite his extensive songwriting career, he released his debut album at age thirty-one.

Perhaps it's for the better — he had more life experience to write these songs: he'd played bass in a local band, did some blue collar jobs, and married three times.

The result is a record at the intersection of country and heartland rock, a classic example of both genres. The music is fairly simple, the lyrics describe the everyday life of an average American worker from the South, life on the road, the prospects (or rather, the lack thereof) of small towns, and personal relationships. Bruce Springsteen, to whom Steve has often been compared, did something similar on a larger scale; to me, he reminded of a less produced Bryan Adams.

A pleasant album for a short drive.

By the end of 1974, David Bowie had grown tired of the Ziggy Stardust image he'd created (knowing the artist's love of change, he held on for a long time), and then, during a US tour, a fortunate stop in Philadelphia, where soul music reigned supreme, came up. "This is what I'll make my next album like," the maestro decided.

He did. My feelings after listening to it are mixed. I'm not really into soul music in general, and this one feels strange somehow; even Bowie himself called it "plastic." The Beatles cover here is perhaps one of the most disgusting I've heard. Half the album is practically filler (though that's often the case with Bowie).

On the other hand, it's not bad as a backdrop to a party, and there are a couple of strong hits.

And it turns out that a three is not enough, and a four is too much... But for the smart move to put the two best songs first and last, so that the album starts off strong and leaves a good aftertaste, I give it a higher mark!

In the mid-1950s, French avant-garde artists developed a new movement called "musique concrète." "Concrete" here involves recording absolutely any sounds (from a creaking door to the sound of rain) and then sampling them (if such a term existed back then).

Holger Czukay was inspired by this school when writing his first solo album. The cover likely shows him at work — in addition to natural sounds, he also used excerpts of dialogue from television and radio broadcasts. All of this was layered over some decent bass lines (Czukay played bass in the band Can) and spiced up with his quiet vocals.

And overall, it's not all bad; the album could serve as a background. I was about to give it three stars until I listened to the last song, where all this variety of sounds began to merge into a cacophony. Even this could have been forgiven if the song hadn't been fifteen minutes long.

This Neil Young is much closer to me than On the Beach, which I got here last time!

The album is very unusual. Firstly, it's unclear whether it's a live album or a studio one — almost all the songs were recorded live (crowd noise was muted, but it still comes through in places), but the songs are new, previously unreleased. Secondly, it's clearly divided into two sides. Side one is just classic Neil Young, with his acoustic guitar and harmonica. This section is fine, but the album really kicks into high gear on side two, where Neil is joined by his band. There's such a noise here, and the guitars are loaded with so much distortion, that it immediately becomes clear why Nirvana and Pearl Jam admired Young.

The decision to loop the album was also a brilliant move — the first and last songs are essentially the same, but the sound and verse order are changed.

In general, Neil hasn’t gotten rusty by his twelfth album!