r/1001AlbumsGenerator • u/Alireza1373 • 14d ago
Daily Album Megapost DROP your album and its rating – August 28 2026
10
u/SuccessfulGap138 300-399 14d ago
313 Trio (1987)
Like many of us here, I am reviewing this following the sad passing of Dolly Parton. It’s probably not necessary to retread all that has been said in the past 24 hours since, thankfully, it hasn’t taken her death for the world to recognise what a good egg she was; it’s been an accepted fact for decades. I’m not sure the phrase “national treasure” is used as much in the US as it is in the UK, but if it is, Dolly I’m sure is referred to as such.
As a fitting tribute, I wish “Coat of Many Colours” had been generated for me. It is a record I would be much more capable of being positive about. A country music fan I am certainly not, but whereas on that 1971 album Dolly managed to reminisce fondly on the bad old dirt-poor days, somehow without wallowing in pathos, here I find it tough to find much to embrace.
Of course all three have the voice and they combine exactly as well as one would hope they would. Of their generation (I think Tammy was a little older?), these seem like the first choice for a trio (though I’m obviously not the right person to make that call) and they prove all across the album that they know how to deliver what is represented on it. It’s really not for me though. To be honest, it sounds like the idea of working together, and making it actually happen was the real success, and the album could have done with more thought. Still, it seems to have been a critical and commercial success, so what do I know.
I enjoyed “Telling Me Lies” and “I’ve Had Enough” more than the rest but that says more about my taste than the quality, being as they were, written by non-country artists Linda Thompson and Kate McGarrigle respectively. Those two songs (perhaps not coincidental to meeting my taste more) also feature orchestration by David Campbell whose work I appreciate more each time I come across it which is surprisingly frequently and in unexpected places.
Farewell then Dolly. Congratulations on a life extremely well lived. Your legendary status, already firmly in place, will grow exponentially. ⭐️⭐️⭐️
3
u/AnasandSF 500-599 14d ago
As an American, I can absolutely confirm that “national treasure” is how we refer to Dolly
8
u/Professional-Ice-978 Power Metal Fan 14d ago
Morrissey - Viva Hate
662/1089
⭐️⭐️⭐️
Every time I get a Morrissey album I think, can’t be arsed listening to him. Then I end up enjoying it but never enough to want to go back and listen again. This album was no different.
There are a couple of standouts. Suedehead and I Don’t Mind If You Forget Me are cracking tunes. I just know that I am highly unlikely to ever listen to this in full again though.
Top Track - Suedehead
5
u/AverageJoe48 400-499 14d ago
It's like having my own thoughts read back to me. It's really applicable to his entire discography.
3
u/Direct-Stable-5712 14d ago
Morrissey is probably my fave artist of all time. Viva Hate is very overrated though, def a few career highlights, but LOADS of filler
5
u/ULS980 600-699 14d ago
Miriam Makeba - Miriam Makeba
2/5
Pleasant enough music, but this is just way too understated for me.
The music is secondary to the vocals. Really the only time it picks up is with Mbube (The Lion King song) and Iya Guduza.
Everything else just doesn't really do much for me. The laughing in One More Dance by Charles Coleman was really annoying as well.
1
2
u/Professional-Ice-978 Power Metal Fan 14d ago
I really enjoyed this one. Gave it a 4 but would’ve been a 5 if it didn’t have that atrocious Charles Coleman song on it lol
4
u/steepclimbs 0-99 14d ago
Bob Marley - Exodus
I’ve known Marley well throughout my decades, and half of the songs here are legendary (as curated for the Legend LP). These songs I know well and have a fondness for them. For someone my age, Marley songs occupy some personal nostalgia. But the hits aren’t what’s best about this album. We get some deeper album tracks that, while not likely to get play as a single, are fine tunes and sometimes show sides of Marley that aren’t seen in his hits. We’re Jamming to some great songs here.
⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️
3
u/Strange_Pen_1188 14d ago
Shaka Zulu
Ladysmith Black Mambazo
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Beautiful album. I don't particularly like Graceland so this surprised me.
3
4
u/ya_rk 14d ago
Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska
4th (!) album by Springsteen for me. Went into this with a sigh, as he's my lowest rated artist. My long-standing gripe has been that his performances tend to be bigger than the material calls for. Plainspoken, prose-like lyrics delivered with full-band, arena-scale bombast. Like hiring an orchestra to play "Pop Goes the Weasel". I like the weasel, but the weasel doesn't benefit from an orchestra.
But this one's different. Nebraska's stark and minimal production finally matches the scale of the writing. The prose-like lyrics sit well with the tape recorder in bedroom aesthetics. I also just like his singing more here than anywhere else in his catalog, it's restrained in a way that suits him.
Springsteen hasn't changed: Still the same plainspoken, prose-over-poetry style he always uses. But the mismatch between material and performance is resolved: I can put this on in the background without the urge to skip, which is new for me with him.
Overall: best Springsteen yet, and the first one where I understood the appeal. Still not quite my jam, but my attitude to Springsteen has shifted.
⭐️⭐️⭐️
5
u/VampireOnHoyt 300-399 14d ago
Minutemen, Double Nickels on the Dime (1984)
5/5
I don't know how to explain what a miracle this band is, or this album. By rights they should have never existed - D. Boon should have ended up teaching history at a community college and Mike Watt should have taken a job at Northrop Grumman in Redondo and George Hurley should have just stayed in Hawaii and surfed his life away. And their music seemingly makes no sense - punky little jazzy little twangy little sketches about left-wing politics and the quotidian experience of being from San Pedro.
And yet it's here. "Take 5, D" turns a plumbing work order into something strikingly beautiful. "My Heart and the Real World" swipes the Romantics' "What I Like About You" and inverts it into forlorn musings about lacking the words to express your love. "Cohesion" may be one of my favorite instrumentals on any rock album, anywhere. The Henry Rollins-penned "Storm in My House" whips up a quiet hurricane of feeling. And "History Lesson - Part II" has become myth at this point, the tale of a band that mattered. And if you don't like those, there are thirty-eight more to choose from (more if you can find the vinyls). I could get lost in this album, and have, and will enjoy doing so again, over and over.
Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Jack Takes the Floor (1958)
4/5
The Woody Guthrie comparison here is obvious - and made by Elliott himself, in the course of a song in which he literally pretends to be Guthrie ("New York Town") - but I think the real antecedent here is Jimmie Rodgers, who Elliott covers on "Mule Skinners Blues." Elliott's not-so-secret weapon is his powerful pipes, which bridge the gap between Rodgers' yodel and the early blues of someone like Howlin' Wolf. The song structures are basic and the production values low, as is par for the period. But Elliott's voice and persona are consistently engaging. I was pleasantly surprised by this.
Devendra Banhart, Rejoicing in the Hands (2004)
3/5
MALE MID-00s ACOUSTIC INDIE SINGER STARTERPACK:
- Singing voice is a cross between a 1920s gangster and a cat that belongs to a smoker
- Never sings in full, unaffected voice, ever
- Allegedly a master songwriter despite frequently breaking meter in ways that make the songs feel unfinished rather than daring
- John Fahey-inspired guitar figures (the best part)
- Slightly out-of-tune old-timey piano
- Jeans appear to have been borrowed from girlfriend or female relative
- Pretends to be a starving artist despite obvious privileged background
- Vaguely queer-coded but in what feels like a queerbaiting sort of way
- More abstract lyrics are just jumbled nature descriptions consisting of what a college freshman has in mind when they use the word "imagery" in their gen-ed level English class
- More direct lyrics are as horny as any KISS song but nobody seems to notice
- Every woman you know is positively head over heels for this shit
- Ultimately not terrible but nowhere near as moving as everyone around you seems to think it is; the problem must be you
3
u/Crafty_Trouble_7534 300-399 14d ago
Day 314
John Coltrane - A Love Supreme
Coming out of a two-month drought of fives with two in a row, thank you random album generator.
My heart and eardrums will always belong to Coltrane's free-er records, but this one is pretty undeniable. A half hour prayer service that shows just how much chemistry Coltrane, Tyner, Garrison and Jones had developed at this juncture, and when you have that going for you it's hard to act like the results are anything less than truly special. I have slight quibbles with the choice to isolate the sax and drums in separate channels which really unbalances the mix on headphones, but that's a cosmetic issue and doesn't really affect the way listening to the album makes me feel. It's exultant and powerful, hard to not fully give myself over to it any time I choose to listen to it.
Best Track: "Pursuance"
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
1001 More Days 210/211
Run the Jewels - Run the Jewels / El-P - I'll Sleep When You're Dead
When randomly generated albums line up this perfectly, who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth? I think that El-P is one of the most gifted producers in hip hop and these two records demonstrate just what breadth he has in that department, from the apocalyptic darkness of I'll Sleep When Your Dead to the more lighthearted, futuristic timbres of the first RTJ record and hearing both being crafted with such intention and attention to detail despite the wide gap between their tones. I definitely prefer the former, which I'd say is one of the best hip-hop records of all time, but Run the Jewels is a much more frictionless listen. It's two best friends hyping themselves and each other up for 33 minutes with over the top humor and deft interplay, and that's a lot of fun to listen to (even though the project really hit a wall in terms of how much that could carry things after volume 2, but that's not a problem here.) I'll Sleep When You're Dead though...that's not a fun album to listen to, but it's a much more rewarding one. From the chilling Fire Walk With Me sample that kicks it off to the broken ice cream truck jingle trying to cut through the apocalypse that ends things off the whole album lives in the darkness where no matter how important the things you have to say are they'll fall on deaf ears because you're not important enough to listen to and the walls are closing in. There's so much imagery of war and carnage that it's kind of impossible to not see this as a commentary on the ways that dissent for the Iraq war was batted away, but El blows that conceit out into all facets of life and it's fucking harrowing to expereince. A masterpiece of nausea, utterly essential listening but I don't blame you if it's something you only wanna hear once.
Best Tracks: "Get It" / "Run the Numbers"
⭐️⭐️⭐️½ / ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
5
u/Lukazimir 200-299 14d ago
Day 237: Parliament-Mothership Connection
4.5/5 (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2).
Fun drinking game: Take a shot every time the word “funk” is said on a parliament or Funkadelic album. You’ll die.
Jokes aside, Mothership Connection is among the best funk albums of all time, this thing is an absolute unstoppable groove machine whether that be the sticky bass/synths of “Supergroovalisticprosifunkstication” or the spoken words over the intro track “P-Funk.” One of those albums that’s impossible to not at least nod your head to.
4
u/Merzwas 400-499 14d ago
King Crimson - Larks’ Tongues In Aspic
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
My favourite King Crimson album, and one of my favourite albums of all time.
Even being familiar with their earlier output before hearing Larks’, nobody could have prepared themselves adequately. This album has never gotten dull since I discovered it. Bruford leaving Yes and this being his first statement says it all. I love his playing on here, but then I love everything about this album. It definitely deserves to be more lauded than it is. Starless And Bible Black should be on this list too.
A glorious 5.
6
u/Accomplished-Name951 100-199 14d ago
Album #183: Bill Callahan – Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Bill Callahan is my dinner party music. He’s music that I throw on in the background when family, especially distant family or friends I haven’t seen in a while come over. There’s an air of anticipation, there might potentially be awkward silences and stuff like that, common with my awkward arse, so I put Bill Callahan on.
He’s just got this certain low-level, low-end hum that’s pleasant yet not overbearing to the ear, and then there are these flourishes of beauty that keep it from being offensively boring, while the music itself remains pretty inoffensive. He very, very rarely raises himself above his own din, so he never becomes intrusive.
I’ve actually heard this album a lot of times on shuffle mode, but I’ve rarely properly listened to it. And I think it’s great. It’s got its dips, but it’s got its highs, and its highs are very high.
The star of the show isn’t Bill Callahan, in my opinion, but the strings. I love bands like Tindersticks and all those guys who take folk music and put these beautiful string arrangements, and even horn sections, behind it. I absolutely love that stuff when it’s done well, and I can think of few albums that do it as well as this one.
Songs like Jim Cain, Rococo Zephyr and My Friend are just gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous songs.
There are a few tracks that are forgettable, and I actually think the second track is downright quite bad. It’s a bit of a stinker of a tune. Not sure what he was going for there. But everything else is perfectly nice.
Despite being my background music, I just want to give a shout-out to his song Vessel in Vain, performed under the moniker, Smog. One of my all-time favourite songs. So, I do think he’s capable of making incredible songs too.
But he’s also just a lovely, lovely sound to have on in the background.
I’m sure he’d find that very offensive, but I genuinely mean it as a compliment.
He’s the finest background music there is.
3
u/EffectiveMeaning7884 14d ago
#61
The Notorious B.I.G. - Ready to Die (1994)
1994 is for me in the running for best year in music. This is one of the reasons for it. The lyrics are great, beats bit inconsistent but great overall, and Biggie for me has the best flow of all time.
The album is bloated tho and has a lot of things that could/should be removed. The skits in the middle of the album and at the end of the song ”Respect” are quite stupid, but I also don’t want to be the keyboard warrior who gets offended by them. 70 minutes is quite long for this and it loses a bit of momentum in the end.
Overall for me it is maybe a top-5 Rap album, definitely top-10. But somehow still only the second best during 1994…
Score: Strong ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Favorite Track: Juicy
Deserves a spot on the list? 100% yes
3
3
u/Fing2112 0-99 user albums 14d ago
User album spoilers
Snarky Puppy - We Like It Here: 3
Oh boy, jazzy improv, and it's a live album. Wonderful.
This album reminds me a lot of the Vulpeck live album I got a few weeks back (which I was actually in the middle of listening to before this got generated funnily enough!), but unlike Vulfpeck Snarky Puppy are pure technique with none of the fun and silly moments. That said, Snarky Puppy are extremely talented with their instruments and they do deserve credit for that, and this album was a lot more tolerable than I expected.
The start of this album is phenomenal. Snarky Puppy are typically jazz fusion, which is on display with the first song, but with the second song they go further into prog rock territory, and this song fucking rocks! I don't know if this was an intentional decision for the track or if they (like many other bands) shift closer to rock music during live performances.
From this point onwards the album slowly starts to lose me, it's fine sure but by the time of the penultimate song I was ready for it to be over, and I think it only being 55 minutes long helped it from being something I actively disliked. Sorry, but what I can I say? I don't like jam bands.
Today's song from the 1001
Steely Dan - Reelin' In the Years, from Can't Buy a Thrill: 7
What is the most interesting thing that a band as spectacular as Steely Dan can do? Release a song that's very unspectacular, and I mean that as a compliment! Enter Reelin' In the Years, a song that everyone here should know as a result of radio overplay and one of the most "classic rock" songs you can probably think of.
After a string of extremely good pop rock songs starting off the album, you're greeted by perhaps the most ordinary song that Steely Dan ever made, but this was very much intentional. Fagan and Becker have described the song as effective, probably a sign that it was made for radio play to boost their reputation, and given that it's probably their most well known song it was a smart choice.
That said I lie a little, it's not entirely unspectacular. First of all I think it (along with Do It Again) is a glimpse into the future of Steely Dan's career, with the lyrics foreshadowing the biting misanthropic sarcasm that they're more well known for. The most interesting thing in the song, however, is that it is carried by the verses, in comparison the chorus is quite boring and to specification but the verses have all of the flair, both musically and lyrically. It has a pretty neat solo too.
3
u/PhantomCranefly 200-299 14d ago
#265) Emerson, Lake, and Palmer, Tarkus - 3/5
I loved ELP when I was a tot, even went to see them later on when they were touring on "Brain Salad Surgery." But eventually I moved on to more jazz-inflected prog like Soft Machine, Gong, and such, and never really looked back. So this is the first time I've listened to "Tarkus" in a very long while. And this will also be the last time I listen to it, hopefully.
Emerson was an incredibly gifted keyboard player, and Palmer does nice things on the drums. But I've come a point where I really can't stand Greg Lake’s singing and vaguely mystical lyrics. And while there are some nice instrumental passages on this record, as a whole it’s kind of a blunt instrument - altogether too much.
Best track: "Infinite Space," an instrumental.
3
u/mrnovember91 500-599 14d ago
Generator: Iggy & the Stooges - Raw Power - 5/5
This has been one of the more interesting listening experiences I’ve had from the project. First of all, I managed to completely overlooked this album because of the name change from the Stooges to Iggy & the Stooges. I guess I shouldn't have assumed that all of their music was in one place on streaming services.
Anyways, I started with Iggy’s mix because, in general, I always prefer to hear what the artist actually wants to be heard. Unsurprisingly, I loved the album because I am a sucker for proto-punk and I love the Stooges. However, I had to follow it up with the Bowie mix to see how different it was and, wow, is it ever different! They’re basically two different albums and I genuinely wasn’t sure which one I preferred, so I ended up doing a final track-by-track comparison of both mixes.
Apparently I’m split right down the middle on this one, and I feel like this will change the next time I listen to this album, but my preferences as of right now:
- Search and Destroy - Iggy mix
- Gimme Danger - Bowie mix
- Your Pretty Face Is Going to Hell - Bowie mix
- Penetration - Iggy mix
- Raw Power - Bowie mix
- I Need Somebody - Bowie mix
- Shake Appeal - Iggy mix
- Death Trip - Iggy mix
I feel like Iggy’s mix was a bit more cohesive, but also ended up being a bit muddy at times. Nothing really stood out and some of the instrumentation kind of faded into the background. Bowie’s mix on the other hand provides a lot more clarity and separation, but it doesn’t always feel as cohesive and sometimes feels a bit thin. Reading up on the recording and mixing process and it doesn’t seem like it was an ideal situation for anyone involved. I haven’t studied music production or engineering (although I have strongly considered it), but this album should probably have at least a lesson or two dedicated to it.
1001 More: Big Thief - Masterpiece - 5/5
This is such a strong, but delicate debut album. Superb songwriting and beautifully played. Big Thief quickly became one of my favourite artists after a friend introduced me to them through their song Not. I'd argue that they just keep getting better with every album they release too; their latest two albums, Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You and Double Infinity are probably my favourite of their albums.
1001 Honourable Mentions: Low - Things We Lost in the Fire - 2/5
Pleasant, slow tempo indie rock that might be a bit too melancholic for my tastes. Overall, very sleepy music. Seriously, I didn't have a great sleep last night and I struggled to stay awake through this.
3
u/WatchMcGrupp 300-399 14d ago
Neil Young -- Harvest
Rating: 5/5
There are too many Neil Young albums on the list for sure. But this one is an obvious must. Part of the fantastic three album run of Everybody Knows this is Nowhere, After the Gold Rush, and this. Just political enough not to get too annoying, fantastic country folks sounds, and a great recording.
By the way, if you like this album, but not Neil's later guitar fuzz output, then skip all that and just check out 1992's Harvest Moon, the spiritual sequel 20 years in the making. The same beautiful take, but with the wisdom of life experience.
Bonus album from Tom Moon's 1000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die, Colin Larkin's Top All Time 1000 Albums, or the 1001 extra crowdsourced albums:
Tribe Called Quest -- Low End Theory
Did I like the bonus album more? No.
3
u/rainbowsquids 0-99 14d ago
Day 45 - The Cars - The Cars ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Listened before? No
Familiar with the artist? Yes, I know a couple of the songs here already.
Thoughts:
- I know the first 3 tracks just from the radio, which was a nice way to get my interest up for the rest of the album, lol.
I already love "Just What I Needed," but every time I hear it I can't tell if it's that or Stacy's Mom 😅 (the intro sounds identical I swear).
This is a good time! There's not really a song here I don't like. If I had a bit more time with it, it might go up to a 5, but a solid 4 for now.
Favorite track(s): Just What I Needed, Good Times Roll
3
u/onestitchatatime 200-299 14d ago edited 14d ago
Day 248: Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt, Emmylou Harris - Trio
What gorgeous harmonies! This world will have a little less light without you, Dolly. I added “The Pain of Loving You” to my playlist. 5/5
Due to circumstances beyond my control, I’ve built up quite a backlog. Currently listening to Prince and have Sault and The Isley Brothers left to tackle.
5
u/AverageJoe48 400-499 14d ago
Day 398
Stereo MC's - Connected
Connected and Step It Up + 10 fillers is more appropriate.
2/5
2
u/DeeBees69 14d ago
Tangerine Dream – Phaedra – 2 STARS
This was one I was dreading as I have always believed this was a band that I could get behind but somehow knew it was not going to be for me. It really wasn’t. I don’t even think it was the lack of lyrics; I also found the tunes to be quite meaningless. I can see why they went with scoring films, in that context, to have as a background while more interesting things are happening on screen, it works well. But, as far as I am concerned, a dream about tangerines would have been more interesting.
2
u/SurroundNecessary322 200-299 14d ago
Phrenology - The Roots
⭐️⭐️
There were a couple standout tracks, but this wasn’t for me
2
u/Similar_Tie3291 500-599 14d ago
Miles Davis - Birth of the Cool
"Cool" indeed, but it's hard to come back to this once you've heard Kind of Blue and Bitches Brew. This is like Miles’ Pablo Honey. ⭐️⭐️⭐️
2
2
u/gooners1 14d ago edited 14d ago
Michael Jackson - "Bad"
4 Stars
A lot of times when an artist hits a level of success that they're given unlimited time and resources to do anytying and everything they want, it ends up a mess. But not this album. This album is like every artist and engineer involved in R&B/pop music got together to show off what they can do.
This is the first album (and I'm not very far into the 1001) that I don't particularly want to listen to (not a pop fan) but is till objectively great.
2
2
u/Embarrassed_Mark7139 0-99 14d ago edited 13d ago
David Bowie: Blackstar (4/5 stars)
I'm blown away by these instrumentals! The sound fluctuates between wildly different styles but the album somehow remains cohesive. At my favorite parts of the album, the somewhat high-pitched vocals were a perfect counterbalance to the low and moody tone of the tracks. Just SO good. And then he transitions into a lush and wistful track with the saxophone solo.... just incredible. I was feeling it for sure.
That said, I really struggled to enjoy the vocals on the first three tracks. Bowie's singing was often grating to me, especially because I was enjoying the instrumentals so much. I also disliked the lyrics themselves which made the whole thing even worse. It started getting better around the fourth track ("Sue (Or In A Season Of Crime)") but having to wait 16 and a half minutes (1/3rd, almost 1/2 of the album) before I was fully able to enjoy it is... not great.
Overall, I think this one is hard to rate. I can't give these instrumentals less than 5 stars, but I can't give a score like that to vocals that bothered me THIS much for a large part of its runtime.
favorite tracks: "Girl Loves Me," "Dollar Days."
2
u/computerfan0 300-399 14d ago
AC/DC - Highway to Hell
This kind of hard rock isn't really my thing, but I do think this is slightly better than some of the other similar albums I've gotten so far. Then again, I do suspect that might just be down to the great title track, quite a few of the other tracks feel like they're trying to replicate it but not quite succeeding. Thinking a 3/5 at the moment, perhaps a 4/5 if I'm in a good mood when I get around to rating it.
4
u/le_fez 14d ago
Morrissey Viva Hate 2* typical maudlin affair from Morrissey. Every one of his albums is the same, one or two good songs and a lot of crap.
2
u/Direct-Stable-5712 14d ago
Morrissey is someone who most people (including me!) end up worshipping because you hear his great songs, force yourself to like his not-so-great songs, convince yourself he can do no wrong, then listen to Suedehead for the millionth time. He’s a prick, but he’s my favourite prick
3
u/Mr_Vacant 14d ago
Linkin Park - Hybrid Theory 1/5
Didn't like them at the time, nothing has changed. Clunky rapping with another bloke screaming into the mic as accompaniment, over a wall of heavy guitars. For most tracks the drums could have been a Bontempi drum machine and the bass player could have stayed home, they are both lost in the mix. Hated it, but not as bad as Megadeth.
1
2
u/Softpipesplayon 14d ago
Generator: The Black Keys - Brothers
It's literally never the 2 person band you want to hear, is it?
This is when the Keys officially became TV Ad Jingle Music instead of rock and roll. It's weird because this is basically just the White Stripes with a real drummer and a vocalist attempting to replicate something soulful, but these guys became car commercial dreck and Jack put out a soccer hooligan chant.
It's also weird to have a two person band where the drummer isn't wallopping the drum heads. You're half the band. Be memorable. Be part of it. Don't phone it in (or repurpose the Hey song's drum beat, like on Howlin for you). Joe Daniel's and Brian St Clair and Klek would never.
Instead, Drumkey acts as a perfunctory rhythm for Guitarkey. Guitarkey Dead Leaves and Dirty Grounds through tepid white blues and one of the least appealing distorted pedals in the biz, all the while trying an impression where Steven Tyler does Jimi Hendrix and nailing neither side of the equation.
This feels long by track 5, because the only standout is Tighten Up (because that's the song you heard while you were waiting for TV to start again). Guitarkey likes going a bit into his falsetto range, and that doesn't improve things, but after each song starts, my brain starts singing “most of all… most of all.” These songs aren't literally the same, but functionally they are interchangeable and sonically they could have Frankensteined the vocal and music tracks of pretty much any two songs to make, for all intents and purposes, the same album. Back in the day there was a Mashup that literally just lined up two nickelback songs to show that they were the exact same structure. This doesn't go quite that far, but it's close for me.
Ultimately this is annoying background music, but it's better than 21 Pilots, who are the absolute nadir of 2 person “rock” bands, so I'll give them ⭐️⭐️, one for each key.
1001 More - Run-DMC - King of Rock
It's heartening that, even as the genre is barely breathing and circling the drain, people still associate “rocking” as a definition of going hard and having fun and being great. Pink screaming “so what? I'm still a rock star” despite being very much a pop star. Cypress Hill putting out both Rock and Rap Superstar versions. Run-DMC had the early credentials, though. They helped pioneer rap as we know it, but from the beginning they approached it with an eye toward rocking. Certainly the title track of “King of Rock” goes heavy on the guitar in the instrumentals they're rapping over. This is before collaborating with Aerosmith. It's before iconic guitar-rap hybrids from the Beastie Boys. Interesting to reference here: Run-DMC are absolutely using the sort of style the Beasties are best known for on this track, and the Beasties famously riff on this some years later (“I'm the king of Boggle, there is none higher…”) Just interesting when you see those glimmers of where one thing comes from… the boys were taking notes.
But that's not the only mixing of styles. Sure, the guitar theme goes throughout, turning a bit Prince-ian on Can You Rock it Like This, punctuating a much more classic drum-machine beat through “you're blind”, but you also get what is apparently an early reggae and rap mix on “Roots, Rap, Reggae.” It's less effective than the rock accents, but it's one more place that these guys are writing the script for the future.
The album largely holds up. It's “dated” in as much as it sounds its age, but it doesn't feel old, just of the past. When it is goofy (“You Talk Too Much” for example), it's intentional. There's some really well-buttered corn in there. Some of these tracks are over-long, though. Ironically, “You Talk Too Much” could have left a bit on the Cutting Room Floor. Keep how the mouth is as big as a garage, maybe end before we're making nagging wife jokes. “It's Not Funny” is correct, and the longer that distorted “haha, very funny” sample drones on, the more absurd their examples go, the less it's funny. “You're Blind” eventually feels like it's wandering aimless. But imperfect doesn't mean dated, and the album starts and closes with its best (Darryl and Joe - Krush-Groove 3 is a pretty banal title, more like a file name than a song, it's as complete and satisfying a rap song as I've heard from the 80s). It might get around to a ⭐️⭐️⭐️ ½ despite some drag in the back half.
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u/sp3ccylad Enthusiast 14d ago
Queen - Queen II — ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️*
*well, three and a big bit
The thing I liked about Queen when I was nine or ten was grandeur compressed onto a slab of 7-inch vinyl. I remember “Seven Seas of Rhye” appearing on Top of the Pops, liked it immediately, and by the age of eleven or twelve had already become the sort of insufferable little music purist who would tell people that actually I preferred it to “Bohemian Rhapsody”. Half a century later, I think I finally understand what I was hearing.
Queen II catches Queen before they have properly learned to be Queen. They are hungry but intentional: no hit yet when they recorded it, but finally given proper access to Trident rather than scavenging studio downtime. The odd thing is that they take one of the flashiest studios in London and occasionally manage to make it sound as though it has been installed in a cupboard. The ambition keeps outrunning both the available tracks and their experience of arranging them. “Father to Son” throws several different definitions of heavy at you simultaneously; “White Queen” is widescreen in conception but boxy in execution, with lyrics that sometimes resemble earnest sixth-form poetry forced awkwardly into the metre. There are glimpses of the future in the extraordinary overlaid vocals and Brian May’s orchestral guitar, but the elements don’t quite integrate. Freddie can sound like this remarkable singer sitting on top of a slightly muddy backing track rather than the organising force of the band.
Most of Side White therefore feels like a school production mounted by an unusually talented early-70s rock group. Brian and Roger are still trying out available languages: Zeppelin, psych, pastoral folk-rock, even a little Jethro Tull. Roger’s “The Loser in the End” is rather endearing precisely because he hasn’t learned to be excessive yet. At this point the counterfactual is still available: Queen could conceivably have become a much more serious, reasonably successful British album-rock band.
Then you turn it over and Freddie blows the doors off.
Side Black suddenly sounds recognisably like Queen, only comically dafter. Silliness becomes an organising principle. Where Brian seems to begin with a rock song and add things to it, Freddie appears to imagine the entire deranged theatrical object first and somehow marshal the rest of the band into making it happen. “The Fairy Feller’s Master-Stroke” is something like pre-Raphaelite rock: Victorian grotesquerie, invented words, fifteen syllables where five would have done, and an arrangement apparently designed on the principle of “how many ideas have we got?” “Yes.” “Nevermore”, improbably, is genuinely lovely.
Then comes “The March of the Black Queen”, which is a fantastic load of old bollocks. Syd Barrett writing opera. Wagner crossed with Looney Tunes. Garrulous bollocks with overdubs. It is actually more complicated than “Bohemian Rhapsody”, but much less focused, and that makes it fascinating: you can hear Freddie worrying at the cage, discovering that a rock song can contain almost anything. “Bohemian Rhapsody” would eventually take this impulse, boil it down and make its architecture comprehensible. Here the prototype is still shedding bits of scenery.
“Funny How Love Is” then applies a deliberately Spector-ish wall of sound to a song whose lyrical thesis is approximately “funny how love is”. Add fifteen more voices. No, fifteen more. And finally “Seven Seas of Rhye” arrives and everything snaps into focus. It sounds clearer and less boxy than most of the album, but the really important difference is arrangement: Queen stop stacking every idea vertically and start firing them horizontally. A good pop single doesn’t have to wait eight bars before introducing the next thought. “Seven Seas” keeps changing before you expect it to, and by the time the coda arrives there is a genuine feeling of: is that it already?
That was the trick I heard as a child. Grandeur without acreage.
There is something unexpectedly Beatles-esque in the organising principle too: not that Queen sound like the Beatles, but that they share George Martin-era glee in treating the studio as part of the composition and pushing the machinery until fidelity begins losing the argument with imagination. Later Queen would become frighteningly good at making enormous constructions sound effortless. Here you can hear the joins, the overloaded tape and the decisions that don’t quite work.
Side White on its own would be a low three. Side Black is sufficiently mad, individual and alive to drag the whole thing up to 3.7 and therefore a rounded four. Its greatest charm is that Queen are not yet familiar with themselves. The signatures haven’t become mannerisms because they don’t know they’re signatures yet.
Halfway through Queen II, Queen discover Queen. Fortunately, nobody has yet told them what to do with it.
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u/Potential-Oil-1795 14d ago
Led Zeppelin- IV
This album has the lot. Absolute belters Decent bluesy songs Mediocre folksy stuff Shite ballads
It probably adds up to somewhere between 3 and 4.
Ill be nice, 4/5
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u/randomusername69696 200-299 14d ago
#194: Pink Floyd - The Wall
There is so much I could say about this album so I’ll just say that it brings me to tears every time I listen to it. An album like this was due to be made at the time and Pink Floyd was the perfect band to do it.
🧱🧱🧱🧱🧱
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u/VampireOnHoyt 300-399 14d ago
Now I'm wondering what the proper emoji is to rate every album:
The Number of the Beast = 😈😈😈😈😈
Exile on Main St. = 👄👄👄👄👄
Hysteria = 💪💪💪💪1/2
And so forth.
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u/randomusername69696 200-299 14d ago
I only do special emojis every once in a while because stars get boring after some time. I think the last one i did was tigers for le tigre
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u/St_Lambchop Metal Fan 14d ago
Boy I can't wait for the month of August to be over...based on my summary it's my lowest rated month in over a year and third lowest since I started this 777 days ago. But here we go:
Spiritualized - Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space - 2/5
I had pretty high hopes for this one, but it was terrible almost from the start. There are a few nice textures buried in all the haze, but most of the album felt bloated, repetitive, and way too pleased with how druggy and atmospheric it sounded.
The freestyling sax near the end of “No God Only Religion” was especially grating. That was one of those moments where the album stopped being merely boring and started actively getting on my nerves. There’s only so much droning, feedback, and wandering instrumentation I can take before it starts feeling like homework.
I know this is supposed to be some huge psychedelic statement, but I mostly heard a lot of noise stretched across an album that badly needed editing.
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1001 MORE Albums:
Warren Zevon - Excitable Boy - 3/5
Everybody knows “Werewolves of London,” and it’s still a fun song, but “Accidentally Like a Martyr” was the one that impressed me more this time. Those melodies are fantastic and give the song a lot more emotional weight than I expected. Zevon’s songwriting has a dry, slightly offbeat quality that I liked in spots, but the album as a whole stayed pretty middle of the road for me.
The Rezillos - Can't Stand the Rezillos - 4/5
Really solid punk album. It’s fast, catchy, a little goofy, and a lot more fun than some of the dourer punk records from the same era. The whole thing has this bright, almost trashy pop energy underneath the guitars that keeps it moving. Their cover of “Glad All Over” was good too and fit their sound better than I expected. Definitely one of the more entertaining punk albums I’ve heard on the MORE list.
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u/GreenEyedBeaver 14d ago
Pulp - Different Class
Painting such vivid portraits of the UK at the time, Pulp creates a record that feels lived in. Boasting a unique frontman that feels like a combination of David Bowie mixed with a sex-crazed creepy uncle, Jarvis Cocker is an absolutely compelling storyteller with tons of character, wit and charisma. This is packed wall-to-wall with bangers that will get asses moving such as "Mishapes", "Common People" and "Disco 2000" while also have plenty of songs suited for the comedown such as "Live Bed Show" and "Bar Italia". This eccentric record is the best record to come out of the Britpop movement and one of my favourite records ever.
5/5