Reviews by syrinx

I read a few reviews before listening and apparently people here hate Frank Sinatra? Why? I am 100% positive he was an absolute asshole in real life but as an artist, there weren't many (if any) who did what he did better. I mean, come on, he's a legend for a good reason.
This album is kind of a mixed bag though. Individually I love Sinatra and Jobim, together they don't quite mash up for me. Girl From Ipanema is great, though not as good as the Getz/Gilberto version which I feel is the definitive one. The rest of the album has its highs and lows, but mostly just kind of hovers there around the middle. Definitely not Frank's best but enjoyable nonetheless. 3.5/5 but rounding down because it's not good enough for a 4.

This is either going to be an album I absolutely love or hate to pieces. I can't decide which.
First song - so far so good, I dig it. I can tell that a lot of synth pop bands from the 80s owe a lot to this record already. Honestly I don't get the hate for this one. Yeah Frankie Teardrop is weird but that's sort of to be expected I think. And I feel like it's weird in a good way. For something that came out in 1977, this is amazingly ahead of its time.
I don't know why this has such low reviews here. I wouldn't really make a point to sit and listen to this one again but I think it is a great album and I am very glad to have heard it this morning. 4/5

Good old 80s pop. Everyone knows Faith, of course, and that's a banger for sure. There are a few others here that I would never have admitted to liking back when I was a kid. But this album aged fairly well if you don't pay attention to the lyrics too closely. It's well recorded, well produced, well sung. I think it checks all the boxes it was trying to check when George Michael set out solo. 3.75/5

So I'm just a couple minutes in to this album and all I can think is something I am reminded of very strongly - did you ever go to Disney World in like the early 90s? This sounds exactly like the ambient music playing when you first get into EPCOT Center. Like I am pretty sure that I heard this walking under Spaceship Earth at least a time or two.
The second half of the album picks up a little and is closer to what I expected from this. It has some highs and lows but is mostly just kind of something to play in the background. 3/5

Is this a good album? Yeah, I think so but I don't really enjoy it that much. Maybe I'm Amazed is great, but the rest is kind of vanilla. I think what this album shows more than anything else is that whatever the Beatles had together is what made the music great. Not saying that McCartney on his own wasn't brilliant, but you can't listen to this and not compare it to anything the Beatles did. So objectively I think this would be like a 4/5 but for my enjoyment it's probably like 2.5/5. We'll agree to settle in the middle and call it 3/5.

This is somehow number 3 from Paul Simon for me on this list in addition to a handful of Simon and Garfunkel albums. Surely that's too much. I mean Paul Simon was a (mostly) great songwriter but I don't feel like having a measurable percentage of this list feature his music is really called for. And the Simon and Garfunkel records are all better than anything he did solo anyway, the list should have stuck to those. That said I haven't heard most of this album.
Dude wtf? it starts off with a song about allergies that includes a really great guitar part from Al Di Meola? How did that come about?
_______________________
Paul Simon: Hey Al, want to play a solo on my new record?
Al Di Meola: I don't know Paul, what's the song about?
PS: Oh, you know, allergies and stuff.
ADM: Is this like for a Benadryl ad?
PS: No. Just a normal song on my album that's gonna have a totally normal cover photo.
ADM: That sounds weird Paul. Will I be on the rest of the record?
PS: No, just the allergy song.
ADM: I'm confused about this.
PS: Aren't we all?
ADM: Yeah I guess I'll do it. But I'm only doing one take.
PS: Ok thanks. Want to go get some lunch?
ADM: No.
PS: Oh. Ok.
_________________________
There are two notable things about this record - the aforementioned Al Di Meola feature, and the fact that Cars Are Cars is probably one of the worst songs ever written to make it on a major release album. Other than those two things, this album is super dull and boring. 2/5

My first reaction to seeing an early 2000s hip hop album that is over two hours long is...not excitement. I mean of course everyone has heard Hey Ya but this is not exactly something I would be familiar with otherwise. However, apparently there is some good funkier/jazzier/more soulful stuff here? Basically this is two separate albums packaged together form what I gather, hopefully one will be tolerable...
Ok, halfway through the first album, more of the same. Maybe not as bad as some but where is this funkier side I was promised? Standard early 2000s hip hop so far, violence, misogyny, and all. First album down, nothing new, still irritating hip hop that I don't connect with at all. 1.5/5 for the first half.
Halfway through album number two and this one is a little better. It actually does have some interesting things going on - real instruments, actual melodies, well constructed songs. I am giving the benefit of the doubt and assuming that some of this is supposed to be funny because parts of this really make me appreciate how well Flight of the Conchords parodied this kind of music. 3/5 for this album.
All in all this was one of the less terrible hip hop albums I've come across but counting it as one album makes no sense. It is clearly two albums that are wildly different slapped together and should have been separate releases though. 2.25/5

I feel like this is a hard record to rate and comment on without looking at the whole picture of all the parts involved. If you had never heard of Lou Reed or the Velvet Underground before, you may not really appreciate this album as much. This album in context of what else he had his hands in over the years makes it much better. Not that you'd need to be well versed in his music to enjoy it, but it helps for sure. I suppose that can be said for any artist though. But for this album - Lou Reed produced by Bowie and Mick Ronson? Sign me up.
I've always loved this album, long before I knew Bowie produced it. In my mind, Bowie can really do no wrong, and that includes producing albums by other artists. This album doesn't seem like much of a stretch - it has a lot of Bowie in it and I wonder how much of that was Lou Reed and how much was Bowie/Ronson.
All that aside, I love that this album is a completely different vibe from his first solo album and the Velvet Underground records before that, but that both of those can be seen in this one. It shows intentional growth and evolution. Lou Reed isn't exactly one that flew under the radar, but I still feel like he is wildly underrated and underappreciated in the opinion of the general populous. 5/5

In my 40+ years I have met exactly one person who told me that Judas Priest was their favorite band. That's not really relevant but I always thought it was interesting.
There are three things I always think when I hear Judas Priest: 1) the guitars are skillful yet mundane. 2) the drums are always better than expected. and 3) Rob Halford is an absolute beast of a vocalist and should get more credit than he does. I feel like this album perfectly demonstrates all three of those things. I mean if you've ever listened to classic rock radio, nothing here should really be a surprise. Well maybe the random inclusion of what sounds like an British pub song towards the end. But it's a fun album, an influential one, and definitely deserves a place on the list. 4/5

When some one says 'Pink Floyd' I would imagine that there are very few, if any, people who first think of this record. It's so different to what the band became when Syd Barrett left. And they got so much better after this record. I know that this is the first Pink Floyd album and the first album is rarely the best or even representative of what a longstanding band becomes, but this one is really different. It has some interesting things going on but it isn't really anything the write home about. There were a lot of psychedelia records that sounded like this. Once Syd Barrett left, Pink Floyd really developed into a better and much more unique band. This album is interesting to listen to mostly because of how the band changed so much afterwards. 2.75/7

I get and truly appreciate the cultural relevance of all of these 90s gangster rap albums, this one in particular. But I just hate this music. It's monotonous, cliched, and though still relevant as far as the racial commentary it hasn't really aged well otherwise. The abject violence, rampant misogyny, homophobia, and all the other tropes of this kind of music just grate on your ears. It's funny to me that Ice Cube went from this to acting, especially in family friendly movies. He's actually really funny too. There is a little bit more variation in this than most I suppose. I still can't recommend it or even pick out something I liked because this kind of music is just not for me, but it wasn't the worst example I've heard so there's that. 1.75/5

I'm not really sure what to expect from this. I know John Grant a little bit, apparently have a couple songs of his saved on Spotify but I am not exactly familiar.
The cover doesn't really seem to fit the album for me. It looks like it is going to be much weirder and more avant garde than it is. It's pretty typical folk rock. I feel like this is one of those albums that was very personal and meant a lot to him at the time and will find a small audience with whom it really resonates but mostly it sort of misses the mark for everyone else. It's good, not great. I do appreciate his music here and would look forward to hearing more from him but I don't think I'd listen to this one again. 3/5

This is number 2 from Radiohead on this list for me, I would imagine that there is another one following this.
I feel like Radiohead has to be one of the most overrated bands out there, but maybe that's just me. I said in my other review that I don't dislike them, I'm just indifferent and that still holds true - this album is just flat boring. It has nothing at all that holds your attention. I don't mind music that you have to work to understand, in fact I love that kind of thing, but that's not what this is. There are high spots and things that I like about this record but I don't even think it's one of Radiohead's better attempts. I always want to be surprised by Radiohead every time I listen to them and I never am. They are undoubtedly great musicians but their music just lacks whatever it is that I connect with in music I love. And this record in particular falls way short for me. 2.25/5

It seems weird to me that this album was liked well enough that it would be called the third most overrated album of all time. It must have been much bigger in the UK than here in the US. It's not bad but it's not anything that I feel like anyone would have a strong reaction to, good or bad. It's middle of the road early 2000s indie. Was good for one listen but I didn't feel the need to play it again or play anything else from them. 3/5

I was a little surprised to see this one pop up today but as I thought about it for a second, I suppose this does deserve a place on the list. Were the Monkees the first commercially manufactured band? I think so.... But I don't really know much of their music, I mean a song or two here and there I guess. Apparently this is the first album where they all played instruments and contributed to writing the songs? I am expecting generic bubblegum 60s pop.
And yes, pretty much exactly what I expected. Nothing remarkable or even memorable. But good for them for actually wanting to make the music themselves I suppose. 2.5/5 and rounding up because I feel nice today.

So less than 10 minutes in and this is already rife with misogyny, violence, homophobia, and every single stereotype that makes hip hop bad music. I mean who writes a song about drugging and raping a 15 year old? I honestly don't know how people listen to this and connect with it at all, much less praise it as one of the best albums ever. Yes, he can rhyme things with other things, that's not genius. This is a 13 year old kid who found out he can swear and say shocking things and get famous for it.
I was really hoping that I'd find a hip hop album that I genuinely liked while doing this project, and this one was one that I had heard way back in the day and kind of hoped I would like it now. No dice. This is awful and aged worse than milk in a plastic cup placed in the sun. If this album was released now, it would be so widely panned we'd never hear from Eminem again. Well, that might not be true, he'd probably be playing with Kid Rock at GOP events.
I'm 600+ albums in and this is the first one I had to turn off (that I remember) before it was over. 0/5 and please god let's strike this from the record of Humanity's creative output.

I don't follow hip hop at all but isn't Common the guy that makes hip hop for white people with minivans? I can already tell this one is going to be a slog today, an hour and 17 minutes of this is going to be really tough to get through. After reading a few of the reviews here I was a little hopeful that this might be a but different from the rest of the hip hop that I've heard. Maybe a hint of jazziness here and there. Alas, that's not the case. It's basically indistinguishable from the rest. Less violent which I suppose is a tic in the pro column. But the rest of the homophobia and misogyny and self aggrandization is out in the forefront. It's not for me. 1/5

Remember when Fleetwood Mac was an entirely different band? Then Peter Green left and they went downhill. I mean I don't remember that because I wasn't born yet but still. The funny thing to me is that this album was supposed to be a departure from Rumors and go in a completely different direction but it really just sounds like B-sides from Rumors and recordings that didn't make the final cut on that album. I would expect that a band snorting a literal mountain of cocaine while dropping acid like tic tacs during recording would come out with something a little more exciting and energetic than this. It's super bland. And it goes on forever. An hour and fifteen minutes and not one song that I saved or can really even remember. I might enjoy the odd Fleetwood Mac song here and there but none of them come from this album. 2/5

So here's the thing with The Roots - they are all such amazing musicians but I don't like the music they make. This record is mostly fairly straightforward hip hop but includes snippets of other, more interesting styles here and there. I would love to he a jazz record by The Roots. They may well have released one, I can't say I really follow them at all. As for this one, I lost interest quickly and it was much too long. I think that's a product of the time it was released, seems like most records from the late 90s/early 2000s are overly long because they all came out on CD. But imagine if every album ever made had been a double LP - there would have been an awful lot of filler on every record. And a hip hop record like this all blends together for the most part anyway so it just seems to go on and on.
I'd like to give an extra star for the musicianship that I know they are capable of but I just can't do it. There was just enough in this that was interesting to not absolutely hate it, but I still wouldn't listen again. 2/5

I expected something so much better from a band called The Flying Burrito Brothers. I wasn’t hoping to hear a sappy country record. There was some good guitar work here and there but for the most part this was really flat and unmemorable. Wouldn’t listen again 2/5