Reviews by pops

I appreciate the trashy, campy horror vibe they are going for and I bet they were really fun live. As an album though, the novelty began wearing off before the end.

I feel like I now know what you would get if you crossed Steely Dan and Queen, and it’s not pretty.

It lacks a standout banger like Move On Up or Superfly, but it’s Curtis Mayfield so it’s still going to be great.

I live near a medieval church and often cut through the graveyard on my way to the local shop. Today I got to do that while pretending I was in a horror movie as I listened to the bit from The Exorcist. But that was probably the most fun I had with this otherwise slightly dull album.

Is this the most middlebrow album ever made? American Pie is catchy as hell though.

London Calling is the rare double album that's all killer and no filler. The title track may be overplayed (thanks unimaginative directors who don't trust viewers to know when something is set in London), but if you're bored of that, there's always The Card Cheat, Death or Glory, Lost in the Supermarket, Rudie Can't Fail and so many other songs that would have been most other bands’ classic hit single.

I've never thought of myself as a Paul Weller fan, just someone who likes the odd song by him. However, over the past couple of years, I've been realising just how many of those songs there are. (The Guardian made a playlist of the best 30 tracks from across his career, and they honestly all slap.) Listening to this album was another step towards admitting that maybe I just really like Paul Weller.

It's not as extraordinary as Hounds of Love, but what is? It's still great, and This Woman's Work is one of her best.

I've never been a huge fan of 50 Cent's flow (I always think he makes it sound like hard work) but this album has some absolutely undeniable hooks.

It’s pretentious, arty nonsense and I bloody love it.

I’m 223 albums in, and the biggest revelation so far is how much I’ve enjoyed the jazz albums. This was no exception - I especially loved the funkier tracks like Inner Crisis.

A song from 1989 about being addicted to your phone - now that’s prescient. Otherwise this is very of its time, but in a fun way. Along with the playful samples and impressively eclectic mix of collaborators (Mark E Smith and Queen Latifah, together at last), there’s some catchy songs here.

I always think Bat Out of Hell is poking fun at the inherent ridiculousness of rock & roll, but it's like Mel Brooks' Young Frankenstein - a spoof made with such skill and care by people who genuinely love the thing they're parodying that it becomes a classic in its own right.

I got a bit of a Replacements vibe on Somewhere, which isn't a bad thing, but sums up that this album is 1980s US alt rock to a fault.

I know and love Another Girl, Another Planet, but I'd always thought of The Only Ones as one-hit wonders. Luckily, it turns out they had plenty of other tunes where that came from.

This album put me in mind of a grittier (or should that be more gravelly?) Sheryl Crow, which isn't something I knew I needed in my life. I liked this a lot - it's not re-inventing the wheel (more title puns), but I enjoyed the rawer take on country and there are some strong songs here.

This is my second Cure album. I liked the first one, Seventeen Seconds, but also felt like it washed over me - it was maybe bigger on atmosphere than tunes. This one was much more intense but also held my attention more. So, it's a thumbs up for intense, attention-grabbing Pornography.

It was a bit same-y, but I liked it.

I was really into Eels back in the late 1990s/early 2000s. Around Shootenanny, it started to feel like diminishing returns for me, but listening to this reminded me why I became a fan to start with.

I listened to this on headphones in the office, and realised during Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out that I was grinning like an idiot at my desk. It's not my favourite Springsteen album (Darkness on the Edge of Town slightly edges it out), but it's still a really good time.