Reviews by pops

I’d never heard of Jazmine Sullivan, so this was a good discovery. I liked this album a lot - frank, funny and short enough that it’s never in danger of wearing out its welcome.

Although I like this album a lot (and bought it!), I'm not that surprised to read it was dropped from later editions of the book. If you've already got Elephant and White Blood Cells, then the White Stripes are pretty well represented on this list. That being said, this has some great songs and I like that they are trying a different sound.

When you call yourself Minutemen, there's an expectation that your songs are going to be short. And they are - the problem is there are 43 of them. I liked a lot of this, but it could have easily lost a good to 10-15 tracks.

I don't think I've ever given Nine Inch Nails a fair hearing before. I wasn't familiar with the term 'edgelord' in 1994, but if I had been, that's definitely how I'd have described someone living in Sharon Tate's old house while writing songs called Piggy and Mr Self Destruct. It just all smacked of trying a bit too hard to be shocking and dark. I shouldn't have been so quick to write them off though - this has some pretty strong songs. (I still prefer Johnny Cash's version of Hurt though.)

Definitely an album of two halves - one ambient, one a bit punkier - but luckily I liked them both.

This takes me back to my teens - listening to this album in the dark, thinking I was really deep. I still enjoy it, although I can now admit there might be a couple of skippable tracks (cough *Lilac Wine* cough). It would have been so interesting to see where Jeff Buckley went next, but sadly we'll never know.

Yesterday I was talking to a friend who said they didn’t know why Mr Brightside is so overplayed when The Killers have better songs and I was bit like “do they, though?” And then today I got Hot Fuss. (Coincidence? Yes, 100%.) So now I can say Mr Brightside is overplayed for a reason, but The Killers do have other good songs.

It started strong, then settled into a nice laidback groove without any particularly memorable songs, then started sounding like he was playing around with the pre-sets on a new keyboard.

I've always been a Neil Young agnostic - I like the odd song, but never really felt the need to delve into his back catalogue - but I enjoyed this more than I thought I would. I'm intrigued now for his other albums that must be coming my way.

I recently read a book which suggested the cult that’s sprung up around this album has more to do with Dennis Wilson being photogenic and tragic than the music. I truly believe Pacific Ocean Blue is so good, I would still give it five stars if it was by the balding, belligerent Beach Boy Mike Love and not the handsome, hirsute one, but you’ll just have to take my word for it.

In his book Yeah Yeah Yeah, Bob Stanley puts forward his theory that Paul Simon has soundtracked more family car journeys than any other musician in history, which rang true to me. Graceland was definitely a favourite in our car when I was a kid, but that's only one of the reasons I was smiling all the way through this. Despite some of the questions hanging over how it was recorded (and how credit was shared), this is just a really great, joyful collection of songs.

This was definitely straddling the fine line that separates interesting and irritating. I liked the first few tracks but by the end I was ready for it to be over.

It's fun in an 'everything but the kitchen sink' kind of way but after three of their albums, I think I can safely say that Queen are one of those bands where I'm fine sticking to the Greatest Hits.

The title track reminded me of an ex-boyfriend and the time we dodged a train conductor after realising our tickets weren’t valid on that service. I felt so guilty, I asked him if he thought they could track us down via CCTV and he started singing I Am A Lonesome Fugitive at me. Credit where it’s due, that was pretty funny. Anyway, despite clearly not being cut out for the outlaw life, I enjoyed this.

I started off thinking this really wasn’t for me but liked it more as it went on. Is “side two” just better or are the Fall an acquired taste that I was gradually starting to acquire?

I always thought I didn’t believe in musical guilty pleasures - if you like a song or artist, why should you feel bad about it just because someone else has decided it’s uncool? Then I signed up for the generator and realised that I’m weirdly defensive when it comes to liking U2. So fuck it - I got this album for Christmas when I was 14 and I still love it.

I'd always thought Kid A marked the end of Radiohead's golden era, and it was all gradually downhill after that. But clearly that was bollocks, because this is great. Sorry, Radiohead, have five stars as an apology.

Yes, it's misogynistic and childish but I must admit that even when I was wincing at the lyrics, I was having fun.

If Lenny Kravitz didn’t look like a rock star, would we have turned him into one based on his music alone? Obviously Lenny can’t help being conventionally handsome, but this album feels a bit like the record company wanted a Prince without the sexual ambiguity. Unfortunately, he also didn’t have the tunes.

Ah, the late 1960s, when you could sing about The Lord of the Rings and still be considered a dangerous rock 'n' roll sex god. Led Zeppelin are one of those bands where I only know the 'hits' (in inverted commas because they didn't release singles in Britain), but this made me think I should have been checking out their albums before now. I enjoyed it a lot.