Nice!

I recently bought a five pack of Echo albums. Ocean Rain is among them. From your list, I'd say that Daydream Nation is my favourite of the bunch. The movie of the same name wasn't bad either.

^ First two Bikini Kill records are riot grrrl punk rock classics for sure. Go, Marie! :beer:

Yeah, I'm not doing that. I said at the beginning - and recently - that the decision to accept recs or not lies with me. I also said at the beginning that this isn't a journal of classic albums I don't know, it's classic albums I have never heard, with the implication being that they are ones I should have heard. Ones I know about but have never listened to. I'm not about pushing my genre appreciation, not here, and quite frankly it looks like something I would hate. That's not the deal here. I need to have some sort of basic interest in or appreciation of the artist to accept it. Also, I'm not doing any compilations. A quick read doesn't show me evidence that this is a classic either. Punk classic, maybe, but even so I turned down Never Mind the Bollocks, so there's no way I'm doing this. So sorry, but as Simon Cowell says, it's a no on this one.

Edit: sorry if the tone comes across as a little snappish; just had a fight with Karen and I'm not in the best mood. No offence meant. But my decision would be the same nonetheless. Feel free though to submit it to my new thread if you want.

Really looking forward to reading your thoughts on this one, TH. One of my favorite albums of all time with incredible production by Brian Eno.

Other suggestions: How about Joni Mitchell's Court & Spark and/or Television's Marquee Moon and/or Curtis Mayfield's Superfly?

Sorry hon: did Television and I'm not sure about Joni but it sounds familiar, so maybe in another thread? If it can't be found and you want me to take it, sure.
Wanna buy some crows, by the way?
:)

I'll search for Joni as she is my high priestess and I worship at her altar and therefore so should you. :)

As for the crows, I'm saving up to buy the whole murder of 'em since they'll be desperately needed five months from now. :laughing:

Dude I know, I never expected you to actually do it :laughing:

Sorry about the fight with Karen though

Also did Curtis in the Album Club at one point. Superb album. :)
Thanks for that. I kind of thought the way you almost demanded it was not like you, but it was a little hard to see through the red haze. Yeah, things are going from bad to worse, not sure where it's going to end up at this stage. :(

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...aininLight.jpg
Title: Remain in Light
Artist: Talking Heads
Year: 1980
Chronological position: Fourth
Previous experience of this artist?: Mostly the singles; not really a huge TH fan (duh)
Why is this considered a classic? Look, any album that the Library of Congress say, we’ll have that for our collection, has to be a classic by any metric you care to use.

My thoughts
One minute (or thereabouts in) ---- Good, great, bad, meh, still waiting or other? Good
One track in --- Good
Halfway through --- Good
Finished --- Meh

Comments: Despite the fact that everyone seems to like and rate this album, I wonder if it will be for me? Afrobeats and world music don’t often appeal to me, and this seems to be full of them. In addition to that, the lyrics are described as a “stream of consciousness”, so that might give me little to hang on to. It definitely has an African/funk feel as it starts, the vocal harmonies kind of like a tribal chant mixed with gospel music. It’s certainly catchy but to be fair that’s all it is, to me. I can’t pick out much or indeed anything here that I really like and would set aside, other than the obvious. Of course I know “Once in a Lifetime”, and it’s a great song, but for me it seems almost out of place here. The lyric is clear and concise, the music is different to what has gone before, and it’s more cohesive than anything else on the album so far.

“Houses in Motion” kind of keeps this idea going, if a little more slipshod, as it were, and it almost feels as if the album is metamorphosing into something different to what it was when I began playing it. Still funky, still catchy but the sort of underlying African element seems to be leaking away sort of. “Seen and Not Seen” is weirdly Kraftwerky to me, at least in the flat, almost spoken vocal; not a fan of this one. “Listening Wind” is a lot better, but then you get “The Overload”, which is just almost doom pop or something, I don’t know; very depressing, like Peter Gabriel when he realises the last rainforest has been cut down behind his back while he was composing a brilliant song about why the last rainforest should not be cut down. Meh.

Favourite track(s): “Once in a Lifetime”, “Houses in Motion”, “Listening Wind”
Least favourite track(s): “Seen and Not Seen”, “The Overload”

Final impression --- I would have to say overall disappointed. If this is the best Talking Heads album, I really don’t think I’d be too bothered checking out the rest of their stuff. I guess a greatest hits compilation will do for me. Not going to become a fan any time soon.

Do I feel, at the end, A) I wish I had listened to this sooner
B) I'm sorry I bothered
C) I might end up liking this
D) Have to wait and see
E) Bit underwhelmed; was ok but a classic?
F) Definitely enjoyed it, but again would I consider it a classic?
G) Enjoyed this album just purely on its own merits
H) Glad I listened to it
I) Didn’t really affect me.

Think this gets an E, and in fact narrowly avoids the dreaded B.

Wait Wtf you never heard British Steel?

What in hell are you talking about? That was ages ago!

I figures this was a new thread.

With fifty pages, yeah, of course. :rolleyes: Even I don't post that much!

I've never heard British Steel in its entirety. I'd better get on that.

Top tier album. :thumb:

I know a bunch of the songs, but I've yet to hear the full album. There is so much from that era for me to hear.

Note: from here on in I’m going to go through the remaining albums alphabetically. I’ll be avoiding any I’ve encountered through other threads, journals, or just in the course of my listening, but will mention them and where I heard/reviewed them. So that means we kick off with this.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._-1_Record.jpg
Title: #1 Record
Artist: Big Star
Year: 1972
Chronological position: Debut
Previous experience of this artist?: Zero
Why is this considered a classic? Not a clue.

My thoughts
One minute (or thereabouts in) ---- Good, great, bad, meh, still waiting or other? Meh
One track in --- Meh
Halfway through --- Still waiting
Finished --- Good

Comments: Reading about this album on Wiki, its claim to fame seems to rest on the fact that it was perhaps a sort of pastiche of pop, rock and later AOR, with close harmonies, memorable choruses and catchy songs, and has been likened to Tom Petty and REM. Don’t hear it, I have to say, from the beginning anyway. To me, it’s more like a lighter version of Zep meets Rush with a bit of Sweet thrown in. Second track has a kind of country-ish feel to it, slower and with a sense of CSNY or Eagles about it, but again it’s not anything special to me. Next one sounds like Slade meets Bob Seger, and again it’s not a bad track, but not blown away yet by any means. Bit of S&G in there too methinks.

Nice little acoustic number, nothing great about it, then Slade’s back, joined by Suzi Q for “Don’t Lie to Me”. It has good energy and is probably the first song where I think yeah this could be something. Really like this one. Then we’re all sixties flower power with added flute (god damn flute!) for the decidedly wimpy “India Song”, blechh. Some serious ripping-off of guitar riffs (or maybe those artist ripped Big Star off? Can’t recall where I heard them but they are familiar) in “My Life is Right”, which I find a pretty boring track otherwise, as is the next one, but the acoustic “Give Me Another Chance” is quite nice, puts me in mind of David Gates to a degree. Bit of Supertramp maybe too. “Try Again” is nice as well, more acoustic sort of country-style, which I think is where Big Star shine, when they do. Touch of George Harrison here. “Watch the Sunrise” is impressive too; this is ending well after a pretty limp start, but I still wouldn’t be likely to listen to it again.

Favourite track(s): Don’t Lie to Me, Give Me Another Chance, Try Again, Watch the Sunrise
Least favourite track(s): The India Song, My Life is Right

Final impression --- yeah it’s all right but a few tracks aside as noted above, I find this pretty bland, boring and ordinary. Don’t see what the fuss is about to be honest.

Do I feel, at the end, A) I wish I had listened to this sooner
B) I'm sorry I bothered
C) I might end up liking this
D) Have to wait and see
E) Bit underwhelmed; was ok but a classic?
F) Definitely enjoyed it, but again would I consider it a classic?
G) Enjoyed this album just purely on its own merits
H) Glad I listened to it
I) Didn’t really affect me.

Overall, I’d have to say E. It was B but then I got into the last few tracks so I had to upgrade it. Still, I reckon I could have lived my life quite happily without ever having heard this. Don’t get it, no sir.

Yeah, well some people just have no taste :D

Maybe I have Covid. ;)

This review was a big fart.

You're a big... ah, you know what? Ye're not worth it, pal. Go read some comic books.

I'd suggest Killing Machine afterwards. Both great albums.

...cosmic bat, formed from gaseous origins:

https://i.imgur.com/1UIJxrq.jpg?1

I always thought he was a little nebulous... :laughing:

Excellent review, TH, and I find myself agreeing with most of it. I like Big Star well enough, but #1 Record and Radio City sound generic to me, like they're the "house" band or something. I much prefer when they got weird and imploded with Third/Sister Lovers and Alex Chilton's solo stuff. Big Star is, imo, the most overrated underrated band ever.

I read through and was shocked to see no mention of "Thirteen" and then I consulted the tracklist...

:(

"You know those bands who are fun to listen to cause they make good songs that sound catchy?"

"Yeah?"

"They suck."

I'll never claim to know every classic album out there. I can honestly say I have no idea who Big Star is. If that album had been released today, one might suspect it to be a country album, given the band name.

I'll add it to the list of albums I should listen to. :)

SOME good songs. I found most of it not shit but generic and boring, as I said. I'm not necessarily putting the album down, but I fail to see how it's considered a classic. I'd rather listen to Journey if you're talking fun to listen to with catchy songs. Or a-ha. Or Blush. Now there's a band who should be better known.

I also found #1 Record to be good, but a little boring overall. I can relate.

I've been meaning to check out some of Chilton's solo stuff, but still haven't gotten around to it.

First of all there is a big difference between Power Pop and Arena Rock and, anyway, Radio City is the better Big Star album.

https://64.media.tumblr.com/daaf9c03...nq8o1_500.gifv
https://i.discogs.com/AdsF-koHn0A-rE...xNS5qcGVn.jpeg
Title: Bitches Brew
Artist: Miles Davis
Year: 1970
Chronological position: Oh I don’t know: about his nineteen millionth, I think
Previous experience of this artist?: Kind of Blue

My thoughts
One minute (or thereabouts in) ---- Good, great, bad, meh, still waiting or other? Good
One track in --- Good
Halfway through --- Meh
Finished --- Meh

Comments: Aw hell, I don’t care what you think. Crucify me. You all know I’m no fan of jazz, though in fairness I did thoroughly enjoy Kind of Blue so, you, know, maybe there’s hope. Mind you, this is over an hour and a half long, which triggers me a little, but we’ll see. Most of the tracks are in double digits in terms of length, and more than one is over twenty! ****in’ hell! One is almost thirty! But hey, this is jazz, right? Haters gonna hate, by which I mean, me. The first track is over twenty minutes, so I guess I’ll either love it or hate it. Starts off nice and ambient anyway, no complaints here, though I’m aware we have a very long way to go.

It certainly eases you in slowly, I’ll give it that. “Pharaoh’s Dance” has been going for about eight minutes now and it’s all been very quiet and low-key, not even so much of the trumpet Miles was known and famous for. I reckon so far (will probably regret saying this but) sounds pretty relaxing and almost in a way distant, as if the volume has been turned down or something, or I’m standing a long way from the music. Yeah it gets a little frenetic for the second track, and I have to be honest that I’m just really losing interest now. It’s all a little too improvisational for my tastes. I think this may be a hard sell for me.

You know, in fairness it’s all right, but I just can’t get a handle on jazz in general, and it always just bores me rigid and leaves me cold. This bores me rigid and leaves me cold.
https://c.tenor.com/Gw0Gs8M3pisAAAAC...-at-me-bro.gif
Favourite track(s): “Pharaoh’s Dance” isn’t terrible
Least favourite track(s):

Final impression --- Look, you can all hate me for not sticking my tongue up this album’s, uh, spine, but it should also be noted that I have never ever made any secret of my aversion to, inability to get into and basic disinterest in jazz, so nobody should be too surprised. After all, if you told me you hated or were bored with prog, I wouldn’t expect you to enthuse about Foxtrot or 2112 or, um, Close to the Edge, same if you weren’t into hip-hop then its seminal albums would mean nothing to you, no matter how well they’re regarded, even outside its genre. I’m not denying every jazz fan loves this, but I’m not a jazz fan, never will be, and I don’t.

Do I feel, at the end, A) I wish I had listened to this sooner
B) I'm sorry I bothered
C) I might end up liking this
D) Have to wait and see
E) Bit underwhelmed; was ok but a classic?
F) Definitely enjoyed it, but again would I consider it a classic?
G) Enjoyed this album just purely on its own merits
H) Glad I listened to it
I) Didn’t really affect me.

Big fat B here.

Now excuse me while I go into hiding.
https://c.tenor.com/cRVgIJrKr3QAAAAC/bruh-missile.gif