Reviews by nofaithmed11

This one has aged really well. Great social commentary. My ceiling for hip-hop strikes again, but it's very close to 4 stars.

3.5/5

Their first perfect album. God, what an unbelievable set of songs. And the energy! Unmatched. My sixth favorite Beatles record, and it would probably be my favorite for about 98% of other artists.

5/5

This album is a mess of beautiful contradictions. Inaccessible, but inviting. Dirty and brutal, but fun and melodic. Terrible, but awesome. I think it’s fantastic.

4/5

The obvious, boring choice for my favorite album of his, but I can’t lie to myself. I don’t want to say it’s not close, because I do love Darkness and Wild Innocent, but I simply don’t have a remotely negative thing to say about Born to Run. I think it’s a perfect album. 5 of its 8 songs are some of my favorite Springsteen songs ever, and the other 3 are no slouches, either. Front to back, it is a masterclass of killer songwriting, and exuberant performances. And, I think similarly to the album before it, a bit of a singular work in Bruce’s catalog. You’ve basically got the classic E Street lineup in place now (Stevie Van Zandt isn’t fully in the fold yet, but he contributes a couple vocal parts and helps with the horn arrangement on “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out”), but it kind of exists in this world halfway in between the straightforward heartland rock that they’ll become known for and the jazzier arrangements of the first two albums, and Bruce’s songwriting exists in that in between as well. And for me, that’s the ultimate sweet spot. I love Bruce, and I love what he was tapping into on his first couple of records, and I love a lot of what he’s done over the last 45 years, but Born to Run is quite easily the pinnacle for me. He was so hungry to succeed; he is the quintessential “I don’t have any other options” kind of musician, he had to make sure this worked out for him, and you hear that hunger in every single song. I don’t think his voice has ever sounded more passionate than it does on Born to Run. That voice really drives every song; regardless of what tempo these songs are, they always feel like they’re propulsing forward. There’s such an incredible movement to this record. And as desperate as you can tell he is, he still takes the time to basically write a love letter to the music that speaks to him the most. You can hear shades of Orbison in his voice, you get the Bo Diddley and Buddy Holly influences in “She’s the One”, the Stax-style horns on “Tenth-Avenue Freeze Out”, obviously the shades of Dylan and Van Morrison in the lyrics. He throws it all into this blender and it still comes out sounding like nothing that came before it. I think it sounds so original, and still so fresh today. Overflowing with creativity and emotion and power. A total masterpiece in my book, an easy 5 stars, and my favorite Bruce Springsteen album.

5/5

“Shining Star” is fantastic. There are some other decent elements, but most of it is too cheesy.

2.5/5

The perfect soundtrack for my foggy late-night drive home from work. Albeit not on the level of Daydream Nation or Goo, in my opinion, very engrossing experimental, noisy goodness.

4/5

Volume 683 of “I wish I liked this more”, but still really good.

3.5/5

Was waffling back and forth between my long-standing 4 stars and a high 3.5, but the highlights are too damn good for me to consider changing now. I could probably live with a nice compilation of my favorites between this and Frank, but overall, I just think she was an amazing talent and I wish we could have seen where she'd go from here.

4/5

After two Waterboys albums, I feel pretty confident that I like but will never love them. And that's okay. There *is* some excellent stuff on here, though.

3.5/5

Some cool ideas, but I much prefer where Spiritualized eventually ends up. Overall too droney and repetitive, especially because my brain isn't fried on acid.

2.5/5

Better than I expected, but still not very good and way too long.

2/5

Bridges the gap perfectly between quirky and accessible, experimental and straightforward.

4/5

Extra half-star for the cool orchestral elements. And honestly, there are some other musical elements that pop up every now and then that I don't hate. But for the most part, this is verrrrrrry much not for me.

1.5/5

Competent and pleasant, with a few distinctly solid tracks. Just not mindblowing or essential.

3.5/5

Infectious to the nth degree. Don’t see what there’s not to love about it. Solid bangers top to bottom. Incredible hooks, some subtly interesting arrangements, absolutely perfect guitar tones, and killer energy, all packed in less than half an hour. Probably my 1976 AOTY.

5/5

They've honestly grown on me and I've gained more appreciation for them than I've ever had. The stuff on here I like the most, I think is legitimately very cool. But a lot of it still doesn't do much (if anything) for me, some of the songs are way too long, and the album as a whole is too long.

2.5/5

This must be the most accessible Beefheart, but that doesn’t mean it’s not damn good.

4/5

As inoffensive as it is inconsequential.

3/5

Equally fascinating, entertaining, stimulating, and important.

4/5

God, I want to like this *so much more than I do*. I like Jeff Lynne, or at least I think I do. I think his three-album run as producer of Cloud Nine, Traveling Wilburys Vol. One, and Full Moon Fever in the late 80's can be stacked up against any three-album run by any producer. But...I don't know. Everything here is *so* clean and *so* sheen that I just don't really connect with it. And it's always so, so much. Chill on the vocoder and the strings. Yes, I KNOW that's your thing and why so many people love this, but not me. It's not bad, and there are songs I dig (especially "Jungle" and "Mr. Blue Sky"), but it's not anywhere near the top of my list.

3/5