Reviews by plasma

I very much enjoyed this one

Recognizing Ibrahim Ferrer from Buena Vista Social Club was pretty neat. I was like... that sounds familiar!

The rest of the album I didn't dig that much. The intrumental side of Starshine interested me a bit

I found it pretty plain and uninteresting

I wasn't that interested

BOOYAH

Edit Mar 27 2026: 5 --> 4. I haven't played this album *as* much. Maybe if I play it more in the future I will bump it up more

A very solid album. The one thing I especially like about Iron Maiden is the very prominent bass. Such as in their album Powerslave. I am excited for their self-titled debut also on the list later - I quite like that album

That said, there is a very distinct lack of extreme metal on the list... the metal that is on here is generally quite tame. I think the list should be much more diverse, and push people's boundaries of what they can handle a lot more. Many albums on here are widely critically acclaimed, but nothing that is TOO different. The few albums that are quite different aren't rated that highly, so this 1001 challenge DOES do a good job of appealing to the masses... in that sense. I think rather than "1001 albums to listen to before you die" this is "1001 albums to get educated with popular western music". At this point, I find myself doing the challenge for the latter. I like the challenge for that though! It is a great source to discover and go through lots of stuff

Nevertheless, I am happy when any sort of metal comes up. And Iron Maiden is always happily welcomed. My favourite track may be the title track, or the closing track

Edit Apr 22 2026: 5 --> 4. I like other metal better

I don't feel as connected to the 2000s indie rock bands

Building lego around Christmas time to this would go SOOOO hard

Too plain and pop-y for me

I like the whimsical songs

Edit Apr 16 2026: 4 --> 5. I have really been loving this one

Soooo many great tracks here. Iconic

Edit Apr 15 2026: 5 --> 4

Nice guitars

David Bowie's 3rd highest rated album on rateyourmusic.com. And he has a lot of albums! Blackstar (2016) is 2nd highest. So excluding Blackstar which is an outlier (makes sense why it's so high though), it becomes his 2nd highest rated. Wow! After one listen I don't appreciate why it is so acclaimed. It definitely requires more listens from me to see why

"Snoop Double G" is fun to say. Snoopy-snoop snoop dogg. Snoopy dogg o' double G G doggy dogg. Snoopy doggy dogg o' snoop dogg dogg

I liked how there were unexpected parts

I love stuff on the list that is different and not plain

Edit Apr 2 2026: 4 --> 3

I really like the track order. The songs flow together really nicely. I have known the closing track After Hours for some time, and quite like it

I don't like this one that much, which is funny, cause I really like every song on Soul Mining by The The (also on this list)

It annoys me when 2000’s British indie rock appears. It’s here cause of 1: recency bias - this album was 2004 and the first edition of the book was released in 2005! And 2: the main editor is British. This album *was* in fact removed in later editions of the book

I wasn’t that big a fan of the more acoustic tracks