Reviews by uls980

Much like the Public Enemy album I got previously, this feels a lot like a transition album from old-school to new school. It has some of the more new-school, complex rhyming and flow (Although still some of the old-school, simplistic = staccato flows). The beats are definitely on the more old-school side as well.

Overall, it's solid, but not what I really look for in hip hop. A little too old-school for me.

An absolutely beautiful and lush R&B/Disco record. Everything on this album is a winner, especially the big hit, We Are Family.
But stuff like Easier to Love are absolutely gorgeous tracks. Stuff that'd make a great sample for a 2000's/2010's hiphop track.

THAT SAID, for as positive I am about this album, it's just not something I really think I'll ever go back to. Great album that's just not my thing.

Some pretty good jamming space rock.
It's pretty long winded for my tastes, and not something I really think I'm going back to, but it's a solid time.

Probably one of the better psychedelic rock albums I've gotten from the 60's. Definitely can tell they're from California, which I think is helping (Although I'm not really a fan of Pet Sounds), along with the slight country rock vibes it's giving.

Unfortunately, still not really my thing.

Yeah, this one's not really doing anything for me.
Old school style rapping never really has unless the band is named Beastie Boys.

Just sounds dated in a way that I can't get into.

It's fine, but not for me.

Once in a while this list has some really great stuff that, while I don't think are great picks for the list itself, are still great albums. Take Me Apart by Kelela is another one (haven't gotten it yet, but I have listened before).

The guitars go hard on some of the songs, especially Hero. My other standout is the opener, You Ain't The Problem.

I will say, a lot of it is a little on the chill side for my tastes, but its still great.
Overall, just some really great psychedelic soul.

This album goes from really interesting proto-butt rock/hard rock stuff (The Old Man's Back Again - like its not those at all, but its got the chutzpah. Reminds me of 80's hard rock bands that do a dark ballad), to some really "its perfectly fine" songs. One of those albums where I don't really know where I stand with it. But I think I'll settle on a 3.

Okay, I get why Tom Waits is divisive with his sound.
But this album kinda sounds like a bunch of other artists, just funneled through the lens of experimentalism.

Like the bastard spawn of Nick Cave, Harry Nilsson, Bruce Springsteen, and expermental bands like Diablo Swing Orchestra (deep pull there, lol), but obviously all those artists were likely inspired by Tom Waits vs the other way around.

Weirdly, I kinda enjoy it. Don't think I'd ever go back to it, but its definitely good, and very interesting. Never a boring moment on this album.

Maybe I'm just in a mood that's good for this album, but I'm liking this a lot more than I remember when I first listened to it a couple months ago, and like it more than the Morrissey albums I've gotten so far.

Mostly what I don't like about it is Morrissey's vocals, although they're not bugging me much here, aside from some annoying riffs he does.

And at first I wasn't enjoying the very empty room production it's got going on, but finding myself liking it as I listen to it more.

Overall, really good album. Think my standouts are Bigmouth Strikes Again and Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others.

I fear Morrissey might be growing on me. Fuck.

Surprised at how almost-Western sounding this is. Starting off, it kinda just sounded like a blues jam. Pretty quickly its like "OK yeah, traditional Islamic music" but for a bit it did have me thinking of blues, haha.

But yeah. Same as most non-western traditional/folk, I just don't have the experience or vocabulary to really engage with this. It sounds good. But I don't know of a situation where I'd sit down a listen to this in my daily life.

Huh. Not on Spotify, so had to dig it out on Youtube.

Will say, knowing nothing of this album other than the cover, I have been curious about it as I do like the cover. But it was a crapshoot for what genre I was going to get. It was either gonna be some electronic music, indie folk, or some sort of noise rock.

Welp, I got the indie folk, haha.

And I quite like it. It's a little understated for my tastes (Although when it does pick up like in Madeleine-Mary with it's echoed guitar lines, it's great), but it's a nice listen. He's got a good voice, piano and guitars are nice. It's just a nice sounding album in general.

Couple songs are verging slightly on Pink Floyd-isms like Song for the New Breed. Album's just got a very similar darkness that Pink Floyd's music has. Maybe some Neutral Milk Hotel vibes as well, such as on Black.

So yeah. Really good indie folk. Wouldn't mind taking another listen sometime.

It's interesting to get this the day after getting Norah Jones.
Not that Norah Jones is jazzy like Fiona Apple, but she does play around with it a tiny bit. But comparison wise, Fiona Apple absolutely blows her out of the water.

Obviously the two standouts, Criminal and Shadowboxer are amazing. But the rest of the album just has this jazzy, rainy by sunny spring day vibe to is (A vibe that I remember being even more pronounced on her album Extraordinary Machine).

Don't really got a ton more to say, just that it's some great jazz pop music.

This album is aggressively alright. Somehow manages to feel like a slog even at only 45 minutes. Each song by themselves is good, but all together, it's just exhausting.

Highlights are Don't Know Why (Which is the one I think I recognize) and I've Got to See You Again (With it's more interesting jazzy vibes).

But other than that, kinda a snoozefest.

I'm gonna have to file a restraining order against blues rock at this point.
Not that this is bad, I just don't have the patience for it anymore.

Plus, I'm not enjoying the singing on this.

Will say, best song is probably The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down

Its fine. I just don't want to listen to this type of music anymore.

Probably a "They've been copied so much that their original stuff seems very generic", but this sounds like every hard rock album to come out in the 80s (this was released in 73!!!). If you like KISS, Twisted Sister, Alice Cooper, etc. you'll love this album.

But I just am not feeling it.

Damn, was surprised at this one. Normally am not huge on 70's soul and funk, but this one just starts off blazing out the gate with That Lady, Pts 1 & 2. I've definitely heard it before, but maybe their original vocal R&B version from the 60s?

But I mostly recognize the song from Kendrick Lamar's sample of it in his song "i" (And on a tangent, the demo version of that song is superior to the To Pimp a Butterfly album version). Kendrick had a fantastic ear for that sample.

The album does kinda have trouble keeping the same momentum through most of it. That Lady is easily the most driving, intense song on the record until the guitar solo in their cover of Summer Breeze.

Another thing I'm slightly off with is with a decent chunk of the album being covers, but that said, they're all great covers that translate into the Isley Brothers' style perfectly. I wouldn't say the covers are better than the originals, but they're definitely a necessary cover in the grand scheme of things.

Overall, fantastic record.

Once I got to the third song, I felt like this one might be a song by song breakdown (First time I've done this, and don't plan to do it very often again), so here goes:

1) Heaps of Sheeps: A little pretentious, not really my thing, but it's fine. 2/5

2) The Duchess: Holy fucking shit what is this garbage? His singing is awful where he devolves into mumbling halfway through a phrase, or trails off into nothing. And the experimentation in the instrumentation is just offputting. 0/5

3) Maryan: Actually liking this. Kinda reminding me of some of the avant-garde type sounds in 00's/10's rock metal (Particularly when it comes to Kayo Dot or maudlin of the Well - which makes sense because apparently others have compared them to Wyatt). Singing is still a little rough, but it's good. 4/5

4) Was a Friend: A little long and repetitive, but enjoyed this one a bit too. Very Kraftwerk if they decided they needed avant-garde jazz saxophones in their music. 3/5

5) Free Will and Testament: Musically, pretty good. Vocally, kind of annoying. Like a far more annoying Damon Albarn. 2/5

6) September The Ninth: Some good avant-jazz here, tad long though. 3/5

7) Alien: Some good bass and fun drumming. Again, very Damon Albarn-ish vocals. A little repetitive, but the pianos coming in at the end are nice. 3/5

8) Out of Season: Feels like an undeveloped piece. Just there. 2/5

9) A Sunday in Madrid: Kinda wasn't paying attention to this one, but it seemed fine. 3/5

10) Blues in Bob Minor: Like the drive of this one. First time I've truly enjoyed the vocals too. 4/5

11) The Whole Point of No Return: More of an end-terlude, but it's good. 4/5.

Overall, mixed bag, but I think I'm settling on the 2. Some of the vibes on this thing are great. But some of the more weird stuff just doesn't work for me.

Finally got a Dexys album to see what they're all about. Unfortunately, they're not impressing me at all.

They're basically operate in one of two modes on this album.
Either they're chasing the sound from Come On Eileen, or they're making (What is to my ears) bog standard 80'd bar blues.

Like, they straight up ripped off Werewolves of London's riff for One of Those Things. Can we leave that poor song alone and stop sampling/ripping it off for a song that is nowhere near as good?

So yeah. Perfectly fine 80's bar blues, but that is not a genre that is going to get me excited for the music. Dexys probably belong on the list, but 3 albums is egregious. Just keep the album with Come On Eileen on the list and call it a day.

Every once in a while this album hits on something really damn good. The riff to Everybody's Been Burned, the verses of Thoughts and Words.

But then something always comes and ruins it or undercuts the good stuff. In Everybody's Been Burned it's the awful lyrics. In Thoughts and Words, it's the choruses where they weirdly decide they want to ape The Beatles.

Additionally, all the psychedelic backmasking sucks. And what was with that weird alien child at the end of C.T.A. - 102?

Overall, this album is just fine. It's very dated in spots, and just doesn't work well to my ears.

I don't doubt their need to be included on the list, but five albums seems very excessive.

Man, even Rush is catching strays from my souring on prog rock music in recent years.
Other than Pink Floyd, I would have expected Rush to be the one band to have avoided that, but unfortunately that isn't really the case.

That said, this is probably the best classic prog album I've gotten on the list thus far (Aside from Pink Floyd's stuff and Jethro Tull's Aqualung). And that's because, like Pink Floyd, Rush probably had some of the better pop sensibilities of those classic prog bands (Pink Floyd also blended enough other genres like psychedelic and whatnot that they didn't sound stereotypically prog).

This album however does get a little more noodly than I remember a lot of the classic Rush songs (Particularly in the title track, 2112). I expect Moving Pictures to score higher for me than this one, seeing as that album is definitely more single/pop oriented, and I'm much more familiar with it than 2112.

So yeah. Best prog album I've gotten so far on the list barring Pink Floyd albums, but unfortunately I'm just allergic to prog at this time in my life.