Reviews by stade

While one might see "latin jazz" and think high-energy, danceable grooves, this is relatively restrained; its beauty lies instead in its overwhelming warmth. Everything about it is joyful, tender, gorgeously bright.

If it doesn't get the 5 it's only because I struggle to say much more about it. I'm familiar with the Son Cubano genre, and there's nothing quite blowing me away here. That's not to say it doesn't deserve its flowers though - it made me smile the whole way through, it's an adorable album all around!

Standouts: De Camino a La Vereda • El Cuarto De Tula • Dos Gardenias • Candela • Amor De Loca Juventud • Buena Vista Social Club • ¿Y Tú Qué Has Hecho? • El Carretero • Orgullecida • Murmullo

Hearing these guys always bring the nostalgia rushing in.

The coloured pencil cover art is magnificent!

Undeniable classic that does have its fair share of bangers, though it also has a bit of filler. Half-half, I'd say. American Idiot remains the perfection of their sound!

Standouts: Welcome To Paradise • Pulling Teeth • Basket Case • Emenius Sleepus

This came close to a 5 because while it's nothing groundbreaking in itself, it touches on everything I enjoy about this era of funk/RnB/soul. You can just imagine Anderson .Paak gliding on a lot of this (but especially If You Think You're Lonely Now). Loved it!

Standouts: So Many Sides Of You • Lay Your Lovin' On Me • Just My Imagination • If You Think You're Lonely Now • Where Do We Go From Here

PJ Harvey is an immensely polyvalent artist and I respect her so much for it, but the alt-rock direction she went for on this particular album really didn't speak to me. The Thom Yorke collab invites the comparison: a lot of the material here has the same dullness I disliked about Hail To the Thief.

Out of curiosity though, I queued up 'Is This Desire?' after this and actually adored it! Sad that it's not included in the book. Every record I've heard from her has gone in a totally different direction from the last, so perhaps we all just need to find our right PJ Harvey album.

Standouts: One Line • You Said Something

This is claptonslop.

If I wanted to be charitable, I'd talk about the variety of decent drums/harmonica/sax moments and solos on display, or perhaps about the conceivable ways the band might have influenced artists down the line.

I'll be honest though, I'm already not a big enjoyer of the blues, and have never found Eric Clapton's guitar to be that impressive. At his best he sounds like a sauceless Santana on 0.75x speed. Nevertheless, it was "Little Girl" that truly soured this experience for me. Turbo rancid vibes only three songs in, and the rest of the album never really managed to recover from it.

Oh yeah, this man art rocks all over the place.

Some ideas worked for me, others seemed overindulgent and sort of lost me. The reverby 80s sound definitely didn't help. I think it lands right on a 3 for me.

Standouts: Intruder • Start • I Don't Remember • Biko

I feel sort of the same way about this album as I did about A Hard Day's Night: having been introduced to The Beatles with their more mature albums first, it's pretty interesting from a historical point of view to go back and listen to their early stuff.

While I realize this one came first, I feel like I already gave AHDN its 4 for historical relevance. That factor aside, it would be dishonest to give this a high rating when, especially as an album experience, it's nothing that grabs me all that much.

Don't mistake that for hate though! I do hear the excellent songwriting on display, and you could probably find half the songs here on a Best Of Beatles playlist. Truly, I would never speak ill of the lads who would go on to give us Rubber Soul and Abbey Road.

Standouts: I Should Have Known Better • Tell Me Why • Can't Buy Me Love • Any Time At All • I'll Cry Instead

Respectably good energy from these guys, but I found their style to really start to grate only a couple of songs in. Ehh. I did however enjoy their use of audio samples scattered throughout the album, and they hint at pretty interesting themes that are probably better explored in their lyrics.

Standouts: Ifwhiteamericatoldthetruthforonedayit'sworldwouldfallapart • She Is Suffering • This Is Yesterday • P.C.P.

It's somewhat derivative at points, but what does it matter, really.... they're good tunes at the end of the day, a rare sight in 60s rock. Not bad from The Byrds!

Standouts: Wild Mountain Thyme • Captain Soul

This went in directions I never would have expected from a 60s folk rock album. French lyrics? 5/4 rhythm on Autopsy? An eleven-minute prog folk epic?! (Or frog/prolk, as my friend coined it)

Matter of fact, everything to do with the instrumentals here was very enjoyable, and the songwriting itself was overall quite catchy. I'm not usually one for folk, but I will give it its flowers when it deserves it. This was lovely.

Standouts: Si tu dois partir • Autopsy • A Sailor's Wife • Million Dollar Bash

Unremarkable, but it makes for a breezy listen! Funny how much Paul's solo work contrasts with John's.

Standouts: The Lovely Linda • Hot As Sun / Glasses • Junk • Singalong Junk

♪♪ S P E A K E R B O X X X ♪♪

Indisputably, this is an ALL-TIMER album that showcases the best of both OutKast members. I mean it's super ambitious, the release format itself is genius, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and I don't know of any other duo who could have pulled it off as well as they did.

With that said..... I think I always remember this album for its peaks, and end up encountering quite a few low points whenever I re-listen. Going into this, in my mind The Love Below was the better part because it has the songs I love the most, but I forgot how much steam it loses by the end! I blame the sequencing more than the songs themselves; the energy is just disproportionately high for the first ~90mins of the album. Speakerboxxx ended up being my favorite part on this listen, however I'd say it's the one that sounds the most dated of the two (André's still sounds downright futuristic). Definitely a couple of skips on it.

I sound harsh, don't I? I'm nitpicking - this album is FANTASTIC but it's not one I could revisit as much as I'd like for a 5-star. 9/10!

Standouts: Intro • GhettoMusick • Bowtie • The Way You Move • Church • Flip Flop Rock • Reset // God (Interlude) • Happy Valentine's Day • Spread • Prototype • Hey Ya! • Pink & Blue • Dracula's Wedding • My Favorite Things

This album is so close to being incredible!! The Parliament/Funkadelic influences instantly stood out to me, both in the beat production and in their overall humour. Clean rhymes overall, too.

Its one major flaw: they never know when to stop. Just about every song (barring skits) could be cut in half and be made a whole lot better. It's to the point where even bangers like Humpty Dance and Doowutchyalike were overstaying their welcome. Then the sex packet concept itself is confusingly brief, ironically, considering it's sold as the whole premise of the album.

Nevertheless, it's an unique project and I love it for how creatively stupid it gets. There's a song where they bring in a blowfish MC to drop underwater-themed rhymes. That's uncharted territory in hip hop as far as I'm aware.

Standouts: The Humpty Dance • Rhymin' on the Funk • Underwater Rimes • Packet Man

I love this album so much!! It's one long daydream with a uniquely strange atmosphere. I've always found it sort of cold and uncanny in a way - maybe because it's fully composed from hundreds (thousands?) of tiny, disjointed and unrelated snippets mashed together. Its weirdness is its charm! You could draw comparisons to other sample-heavy artists like DJ Shadow and the like - there's even a moment here that reminds me a lot of The Caretaker's work (track 11) - but few defy genre definition quite like The Avalanches.

What's crazy is that it would've been easy for them to go overboard with all the different samples, but they actually show a lot of restraint all while still crafting some wonderfully lush, textured instrumentals. When they *really* let loose, it's on Frontier Psychiatrist, the climax of the album... and GOD it's so perfectly insane! I adore it!! Then on eventual re-listens you even start to spot recurring sounds throughout the project that really give it an extra sense of continuity, so it only gets better over time.

One last note! Remember how I described this album as being a strange, cold and uncanny daydream? I just can't help but bring up by contrast their sophomore album Wildflower, released 16 years later. They lay off the plunderphonics a bit and give way to something delightfully warm, full of life, and still somehow just as daydreamy. I can't recommend the experience enough to those who enjoyed what The Avalanches did on SILY.

Standouts: Since I Left You • Two Hearts In 3/4 Time • Electricity • Tonight May Have To Last Me All My Life • Frontier Psychiatrist • ETOH • Summer Crane • Little Journey • Extra Kings

Björk is a diva from what I've seen. I'm glad she's as experimental as she is and that her music touches so many people in its intended way. But if the point is to solemnly listen to the theatrics and emerge with a new fundamental understanding of music... I'm just not there yet.

Good a cappella though, and while the hymns did nothing for me, I was definitely captivated on the beatboxy/danceable songs. I also didn't have as much trouble as I usually do with her singing, I suppose due to it properly fitting in with all the musical weirdness going on around her. As a result, this might be my favorite non-Sugarcubes album from her to date.

Standouts: Where Is The Line • Who Is It (Carry My Joy on the Left, Carry My Pain on the Right) • Desired Constellation • Triumph of a Heart

I definitely thought a Lorde album would be all stripped-back instrumentals, à la Royals. There's a bit of that in here, but for the most part the production actually surprised me with how flashy it gets, all without ever taking the spotlight away from the singing itself. Loved this!

Standouts: Green Light • Homemade Dynamite • The Louvre • Hard Feelings/Loveless • Supercut • Perfect Places

Awww man, it really hooked me at the beginning and was headed for a 4-star, but lost me as it got deeper into trad Celtic territory. Fork found in kitchen and all, sure, but those first tracks of rock fusion really had me going! The second track in particular had some mind-blowing fiddle (?) solos that I would've loved to hear more of.

Standouts: Fisherman's Blues • We Will Not Be Lovers • World Party • Carolan's Welcome

Dark and menacing album. The singing is tough to love, but the tasty basslines kept me relatively hooked throughout. Hey! I used to say the same thing about The Cure! Indeed, what this reminded me most of is a mix of Disintegration and White Light/White Heat.

I could learn to love the vocals over time, but I unfortunately don't have much of a craving for this sort of music in my regular listening. Maybe if it had more stuff in line with In Fear of Dub, which despite being a bonus track I accidentally listened to, ended up being my highlight of the record. I could never fear dub! Keep playing your shit, bass man!

Standouts: Kick in the Eye • In Fear of Dub

First off, Blood Sugar Sex Magik is just an all-timer rock album title.

Glancing at the tracklist I was surprised to only recognize two songs. As I’ve come to find out, this album isn’t for the big hits - that would be Californication. No, this album is pure funk, with a production quality that actually lets you appreciate Flea and Frusciante’s god-level playing (unexpected after Californication). Truly, Sir Psycho Sexy had me feeling funk I had not felt since Mothership Connection.

This would be a four-star if Anthony Kiedis wasn’t hitting the crack pipe whenever it’s time to rap. Why oh why must he rap. This album has some the worst performances I’ve heard from him! That one reviewer who said his lyrics got better once he started singing about California had it exactly right.

Standouts: Breaking the Girl • Funky Monks • The Righteous & The Wicked • Sir Psycho Sexy

I'll give it a 10 for hooks, and a 3 for its ability to describe itself.

What an album!!! Every kind of soundscape can be found here, each one executed magnificently. You can dance in parts, and contemplate in others. LOVE a project that has you wondering where the hell it's going to go next. By the time the sax on I'm Comin' Down hit, I was just about sold on the 5. Beautiful!

Standouts: Slip Inside This House • Higher Than the Sun • Inner Flight • Come Together • Loaded • I'm Comin' Down • Higher Than the Sun - A Dub Symphony in Two Parts