Reviews by owen

I really like Desmond's sax tone. And loved the fact that all tunes on the album had a common "playing with time signatures" theme. Great stuff.

I had never heard of this band, but I quite enjoyed the music. Yikes on the description on Wikipedia, but will SAFA.

I bought this when it came out, but I don't think i ever listened to it beyond 1996; I quickly tired of it. It's not that bad in retrospect, but it sounds quintessentially 90s.

I actually thought I would enjoy this more than I did. Tainted Love is great, obviously, and there are a couple other decent tracks (Say Hello, ...), but on the whole it's a little less memorable than I thought it might be.

I see there are three Fall albums on the list, which is a pleasant surprise, though I'd include Hex Induction Hour over this. This one probably deserves a four, but This Nation's Saving Grace will get a five when it comes around.

It's weird because I would say I don't particularly like Led Zep, but I keep getting these albums which, individually, I think are generally very good, and merit high scores. This one's up there with the best of them.

Ugh, not sure how to score this. The lyrical content/story is odious, obviously. I particularly hated the squealing/giggling in one track, which gave me the creeps. But on the other hand, I really liked how the guitar sounds on this album, and the musical content overall was pretty great. Going to go down the middle.

Had listened to the debut album before (and saw them live around then), but never this. Most of it is pretty great, though there's a couple of tracks that don't quite work for me (Still Life was one). The Asphalt World had a nice krautrock vibe, and is the standout track for me. I liked the guitar tones a lot in (e.g.) This Hollywood Life.

This is great; already a favorite. I love the interplay of Q Tip and Phife Dawgs voices.

Too country for me. I didn't hate it, but I won't ever listen to it again.

I enjoyed this a fair bit, but it got a little samey after a while. A fairly solid three.

I liked this quite a lot, although I think it could have afforded to be ten minutes shorter. Strong three.

Ok, I liked this more than I remember, actually, which is the opposite of the Document effect. Enjoyed quite a lot today. Maybe it's nothing to do with the specific album, and I just have to be in a REM mood.

Thia is absolutely not my thing, but unlike yesterday's garbage offering, I respect it, so I can't give it one star. I wish I'd been able to find the German version.

Fuck this shitty guy and his shitty music.

I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better is the best song on here by quite some distance. The Dylan songs just made me wish Dylan was singing them. A low three; marginally better than other Byrds efforts.

This album is ridiculously front loaded - the first three tracks are the big hitters while the rest is largely unmemorable. Even though the first tracks are completely overplayed, I have to give them some credit; they're overplayed for a reason. But I can't imagine ever choosing to listen to this.

I don't give a shit if it rips off Wire. I like these songs better than the Wire originals by a mile. This album is brilliant.

Absolutely cracking opener and closer, and although nothing in between is quite as good, they're still good enough to be decent listening and the standout tracks earn it a four. Also, the drumming here is top notch.

For anyone as annoyed as me about the stereo mix on this; if you're on Android, search in your settings for "Mono audio" and have Android mix it back to mono for you. I found it much more listenable that way .

Anyway, I liked this more at the beginning and the end than I did in the middle, where it dragged on a bit. Low three stars