Reviews by wotanmjolnir

It all sounds like incidental music from a particularly dull episode of Hollyoaks.

I'm about 350 albums in, and the best thing the project has given me is a total live for Talking Heads. This is my third Talking Heads album, and it's my third 5 stars. Excellent, through and through.

Oh, and Once In A Lifetime is one of the best songs ever written.

Nice is the word that I think of when listening to Stevie Wonder. His upbeat stuff is nice and jaunty, his slower stuff is nice and soulful ... but nice is just that. Nice. Not amazing. Not brilliant. Not great, or even good -just, nice.

Somebody seems to have replaced the album with a recording of a local am-dram society performing an acid-tinged reimagination of West Side Story.

I had never knowingly heard Cheap Trick before, and didn't know what to expect. And, actually, this is surprisingly enjoyable in a 'this is a bit shit and predictable, but it's making me smile' way. I'm no fan of live albums, and especially not self indulgent Deep Purple 'Made in Japan' bullshit, but the bridge section between Need Your Love and Ain't That A Shame is great, and Surrender is a genuinely good song ... but then I listen a bit harder and it sounds a bit like Status Quo, Suzi Quattro and Showaddywaddy blended together into some weird showband and put out this album. But, then again, I seem to quite like that.

Queen to me are a bit like Guns 'n' Roses - a huge reputation based on a few songs, although Queen do have a lot more than GnR do. They are fine, technically gifted musicians front to back, if a bit pedestrian ... but a singer who could elevate mundane lyrics into magic. Take Your My Best Friend, for example. Now, I love the song, but the lyrics are pretty simplistic, and the music is nothing special, but Freddie lifted it to something brilliant. I'm In Love With My Car, however, is a different story. Ignore the lyrics, and musically it's a pretty good rocker - but Roger Taylor singing doesn't add anything. I'm not saying if Mercury had done it it would have been good (the lyrics make sure of that), but it would have been better.

Tl;Dr- Queen are a bit over-hyped, and the album is fine but not amazing.

I've never been a Country fan (I'm British, we don't do that kind of thing over here) ... but God damn, I like Johnny Cash.

Bowie had to be trolling us here, right? He thought to himself "right, I've got this Radiohead rip-off of an album that sounds like someone doing a parody of me, and I've got a week to live. If I put this out just before I go toes up then people are going to be tricked into praising it, rather than pointing out it's a bit shit. You can't speak ill of the dead, right!"

Also, it's only 41 minutes, but it seems to go on forever, especially 'I Can't Give Everything Away' which ends with around 4 to 5 weeks of him bleating about how he can't give everything away. We get it, Jones, we heard you the first time, and also read the title of the sodding song.

As a child growing up in Britain in the 80s, Madness were a part of the cultural wallpaper. As I grew older they became the staple of office Christmas parties, where 50 year old sales managers would try and recapture their distant youth by doing the nutty boy dance to One Step Beyond or Baggy Trousers. As such, this has been my total exposure to Madness.

This album is better and more nuanced than I thought it would be. The singles Our House and Tomorrow's (Just Another Day) are good, but they are not alone on this album. There is a lot to enjoy here, it's far better than I expected.

This is so much better than a lot of the reviews implied. Decent electronica, although it is overly long - and it's not like there are tons of tracks it's just that they individually go on for a bit too long, each one. Having said that I did enjoy it quite a lot - not 5 stars, but a good 4.

The voice is great, but I just find this type of music so very, very boring.

I really don't know about this one. Willie Nelson is a legend, but this is a collection of covers of songs that I just don't particularly like. I don't get it, and I didn't really enjoy it.

Really good album, I guess less so if you aren't at least a bit of a metalhead. The production is excellent with a proper bottom end driving the whole thing along. It's long, overlong probably and that does go against it, but it is still a great record with very few missteps - i coukd live without Canyon Jam, or at least not all 13 minutes of it, but thats the only dip.

It's not horrible, but it's not great, and the vocals are pretty terrible. If I'm going to listen to New Order it's going to be Blue Monday or True Faith, not anything from this album.

We've Only Just Begun is a lovely song, and the modal shift in the chorus is great. From there though, it's all downhill. The cover of Help is just woeful - I'm not a fan of pre-Rubber Soul Beatles, but that is terrible.

Also, the cover of Alan Partridge's Close To You is unnecessary.

It's not bad, but its very unremarkable, and it goes on for way too long. Pot Kettle Black sounds like The Lightning Seeds doing a cover of the Manic's Australia, and fucking it up.

Ronnie O'Sullivan is one of the most naturally gifted snooker players of all time. Watching him play still bores the tits off me.

I am not built for rap and hippity-hop; rap and hippity-hop isn't built for me.

It sounds like Randy Newman, and that's about all I can say about it. It isn't horrible.

Who really wants an album of covers by a racist, hypocritical, over-rated hack? Let It Grow is lovely (even if it is, ironically, a shameless, schmalzified Stairway to Heaven rip off), but the rest is either unnecessary, or just shit. Willie And The Hand Jive? Really?

Having said that, the three closing tracks - Let It Grow, Steady Rollin' Man and Mainline Florida - are excellent and raise the album. It's only to a 3, but then it is also a covers album with some really shit decisions on it.

I could have spent 2 hours scrolling through my phone's ringtones and had the same experience as listening to this. Absolute shit.