Reviews by rylee

I drove to Lake McMurray to watch the fireworks. I recently got rejected and I needed so badly just to clear my head. I've been crying off and on a lot lately. But it was a good night. On the way back home, I listened to this, because I needed something new my brain could latch onto. This is a sweet album, and I think it's what pops into people's heads if they think about the word "jazz." I wish it had more defining characteristics, I don't necessarily think there was one instrument or performance that stole the show, but I think it was a pretty good album to have on.

You listen to it at home while doing other things. That's where the music is.

I have a friend in Brazil. Recife, more specifically. They're one of my favorite people in the world. This reminds me of them.

Hey uhh I'm getting ready for work but I just wanna say, I really liked this on paper and I haven't heard anything quite like this before, but the thing is, it's hard for me to wrap my head around this being a band. It sounds just a bit TOO polished, a but TOO stiff instrumentally. The happiness absolutely shines through, but I take issue with the fact that I don't hear any individuality in the performances outside of the vocals. But the vocals themselves are fantastic, and they make some great songs.

My last blues rock experience wasn't that great (sorry Rolling Stones) so I went into this album somewhat timidly. I am BLOWN AWAY. Joplin's voice is perfectly suited to this music, and there are times when this rocks harder than any Zeppelin album. It's fucking awesome! I love the audience noises to fool people into thinking it's a live album hahaha

Hi. Uhhh. It's cool I guess. I like the audience interaction towards the end. But it's not my style of jazz. Sorry, Duke.

God fucking dammit dude. This is so boring. I was so /not/ looking forward to this, I stalled on my 1001 albums for five full days. I mean I guess some of the songs are head-nodding, but maybe I'm just not a fan of new wave or post punk? I really didn't like that New Order album either. It's the same thing here. In one ear and out the other 100% of the time. Ugh.

Run DMC did not necessarily kick my ass like I had hoped. BUT I was pleasantly surprised! From the very first words of the record, I realized that there were pieces of Raising Hell I've heard since my childhood. Even though it's pretty minimal and there is next to no variation in the flows, it's clear how important this became to the history of hip-hop. I like it!

This album is like "Let's begin with one of the greatest songs ever written. Got that? Okay, now let's never do it again."

I'm surprised /this/ is their big one. Only one of two on this list, but I feel like I hear a lot more people talk about Red or Discipline nowadays. This made me want to check out the band's heavier stuff, which I guess I'll do after I'm done with this list, hahaha.

Four 3s in a row. Run DMC better kick my ass tomorrow.

On paper, I should absolutely be in love with this. I like Bjork's voice usually, it's got beautiful strings but also some harsh electronic beats, Arca and the fucking Haxan Cloak co-produced it, what's not to love?

I keep forgetting that I don't actually like Bjork, until I listen to her, then I'm like "oh. right." A problem I consistently have with Bjork, especially this album, is that her voice just kinda does whatever it wants while an instrumental happens to play behind it. I don't like how formless Vulnicura is. My favorite song on here is Quicksand, and not only is it the shortest, it's the closer! We spend most of the time on the album listening to songs kinda...draaag themselves out. It's frustrating. BUT I still think it's a beautiful listen and emotionally captivating, even though I don't see myself coming back to it.

I must admit to myself that I am no longer the "wordsmith" that the site says I am. My reviews will be shorter. Why would I type so much when I know that no one else will see it? Except for Kid A. That one needed the long review so I could actually explain why I think it sucks.

This one's alright. Nothing really stuck with me except for the last song. I was sitting there thinking "why does this sound so familiar..." and then Roger Daltrey goes "YEEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHHH!" and I went "ohhh that's why."

I really have no idea why this album is on the list, and that's coming from a Slipknot fan. The debut, yes, absolutely. But they have at least two other albums that deserve to be here far more than this one. All Hope Is Gone is okay, because it's Slipknot and I'm always gonna at least kind of enjoy what they do.

Why not Iowa? That's even darker and moodier than the debut, but it's still just as fierce and violent. Why not Vol. 3? It has the band's biggest hit, it incorporated more soft rock elements, and it's actually remarkable lyrically because it was an attempt to make an album with zero cursing. Why /this/ of all things? In the context of Slipknot's discography, this is very unremarkable.

Wow, it wasn't what I was expecting at all given the cover, but this is fantastic! It's so eclectic and the songwriting is quite good, even the soft piano ballads were songs I fell for. I'm not mad that this is Dennis Wilson's only album. It's short, sweet, and it has everything that a fan of the Beach Boys would want. I'm behind on my reviews. I gotta keep this short.

NO. ABSOLUTELY FUCKING NOT.

It took me a while to figure out why I didn't like this. Cee Lo's rapping style is okay, the production is sometimes interesting, and I'm usually a fan of eccentric voices. When I got to Childz Play, it hit me. What was absolutely killing me was this guy's attitude. He is trying soooo hard to sell me on the fact he's the greatest rapper, the greatest singer, there's nothing he can't do. Well okay then, stop trying to sell me on that and just do it already. Stop trying to convince me that you are the Soul Machine™ and just.../be/ the Soul Machine™. It's so endlessly frustrating. I cannot get past his attitude whatsoever. The only parts of the album I legitimately enjoyed are the parts where someone else is speaking! UGH!

There's apparently lots of different versions of this floating around...the one I heard had just two songs, Zombie and Mr Follow Follow. But those two songs left me wanting more! The titular track, especially, has a killer groove. It's pretty decent stuff, my first introduction to afrobeat or anything adjacent to it. Imagine hearing this and wanting to raid the guy's commune and kill his mother. Insane.

There's obviously a lot of comparisons here to the B-52s. But for me, someone who knows exactly one song by the B-52s (you know the one) it reminded me of The Cranberries, more than anything! Interesting and spacey guitar work, relatively simple song structures, a lead singer with a soaring, beautiful voice. Reminds me a bit of The Pixies too, for similar reasons. It makes total sense that Bjork found major success after this, her voice steals the show pretty much every time.

No. NO.

I can see the charm in this, I promise. It's soft, it's quiet, it reminds me a bit of Nick Drake and David Thomas Broughton. But in no way am I fan of the out-of-sync background vocals. He's got a nice voice and everything, but I want so badly for those vocals to /sync up/ and add some real power to his words. Please, Bonnie. I was so ready to enjoy the song Madeleine-Mary and its seemingly dub-inspired guitar work, only for those vocals to come in and just SUCK. IT SUCKS. It's so aggravating. I'm so sorry.

As of writing, there are 1089 albums on this website's list, which includes six (6) Radiohead albums. I'm on album #74, and somehow...this is my 4th Radiohead album. Maybe the generator knows that Radiohead was once my favorite band of all-time. But because I recently wrote a lengthy review of Kid A where I dove into my history with the band...I don't want to do it all over again.

I can tell you that this might very well be my favorite Radiohead album. OK Computer is the canonical favorite in their discography, but at this point, I am so familiar with that album, I know it like the back of my hand. The Bends? It's still at least somewhat fresh to me. Listening back to it today, I was surprised by Bones. I had forgotten about the song Bulletproof. I forgot that the song High And Dry preceded Fake Plastic Trees. Some lyrics tripped me up when trying to sing along. So the album as a whole is still at least a little exciting to me.

Of course it's whiny, Radiohead have always sounded like that. But at least this came out before the pointless Thom started doing the pointless "ooouuuuaaagghh" sounds when he couldn't think of something interesting to say. The drumming is great, the musical progressions are interesting, the rockin' singles are great, the slow and soft ballads are beautiful...I think songs like (Nice Dream) and Bulletproof pretty handily outshine Just and My Iron Long. It's just a big and beautiful record. Not nearly as ambitious as their later work, but it's more than made up for by Thom's pretty little castrato voice.

...huh? Why this one? I haven't been doing this for very long, but it's possible this might be the least noteworthy album on the list. I had never heard of this band, which is apparently a side-project including two members of Minutemen. It's not even the most popular album by this very band. The Wikipedia page includes the phrase "It's called that because it's from Ohio." Beautiful.

This feels almost completely unremarkable. I mean it's fine, but it's got a nice sound, but the lyrics feel so stream-of-consciousness, that Liberty song kinda just sucks, there's two whole drum solo songs, I guess that's kinda funny...why in the world is this tagged post-hardcore? This is just, like...boring indie rock. What the hell.

There's exactly one song on here that I really liked, that would be Fever. That's about it. He's clearly a very good performer, taking songs he didn't write and making them his own. He's a great singer, especially when he is /not/ doing that one voice that everyone imitates nowadays. But that's about it for me. This album as a whole...I wanted more versatility, more expression outside of that one cool song.

So...

I felt like giving this a 1/5 would be too mean. But NOTHING about this intrigued me, I'm sorry! It made me question if I even enjoyed synthpop or new wave or whatever this is called. It made me go back to the Heaven 17 album I gave a 5/5 just to make sure I still love it that much, and sure, maybe that album just hit me at the right time, but I still really like it. I did not get a single thing out of this. But to be honest, I kinda feel the same way about Joy Division, so...look out for when that comes into my rotation.