Glad I'm not alone in thinking this!

 

-x-

 

 

Supertramp - Breakfast in America

 

The sixth studio album from prog-pop/rock band, Supertramp, released at the tail end of the 1970s gave them their biggest hits of their career, The Logical Song and Breakfast in America, which were two of their only hits in their native home of the UK. The album was also their biggest selling of their career, selling over four million in the US alone and won two Grammy awards for Best Engineered Recording and Best Pop Performance by a Group and continued their move into pop than progressive rock. The album may appear to be a satire on US culture (you may notice the utensils and condiments making up the city, I took a bit longer to see that the waitress is meant to resemble the Statue of Liberty), it is purely coincidental and was intended to be 'fun' and inspired by their adventures in the country at the time.

 

This was quite an odd choice, I know of the group but despite the big sales and familiarity with some of their songs, they really do feel like a group that haven't dated quite as well as some of their contemporaries. It's somewhat divided critics and I can to an extent see why, parts of the album do seem like they're trying to be a mix of the Beatles, Bee Gees and ELO and there is something quite cutesy and 'children's TV jingle' about the pop melodies and choruses, that said, it's a very eclectic and unique album. There's a very interesting and colourful soundscape built up with guitars and plonking piano combined with classical, symphonic instruments, some synths and some charming falsetto vocals, it sounds very...whimsical for want of a better word and does make you feel quite happy listening to it. There are two I knew here through samples of 2000s hit songs - The Logical Song (as covered by Scooter) and the title track (you may remember it being sampled in Gym Class Heroes' Cupid's Chokehold, if you know 2007 chart music), the former is actually one of the more mournful tracks with lyrics about frustrations of growing up and losing coherence, the rest of these are generally very upbeat and dreamy in style. The opener Gone Hollywood and Child of Vision are the album at it's most vast and epic, the latter one in particular contains a beautiful piano solo and Take the Long Way Home in particular has an infuriatingly catchy chorus.

 

This is one I really liked on first listen, but didn't quite appreciate as much the second time. The second half of the album apart from the closing track doesn't really have any big highlights and it is a bit one note in terms of sound. But it's certainly one of the more interesting and eclectic albums I've heard here and has a refreshingly sunny disposition in comparison as to the doom and gloom airing out of many of these. I'd recommend it if you're into that kind of art/symphonic pop, it may not be a timeless sound but it's a very interesting one.

 

8.0

I've never been into Supertramp as much as their contemporaries 10cc and ELO and I don't own any of their albums. I've just listened to Breakfast In America. I already know the title track and The Logical Song as they were the big hit singles and the chorus of Take The Long Way Home gets played a lot at T20 Blast cricket matches when a batsman is out. The rest of the album is quite good with the ballad 'Lord Is It Mine' standing out but there's something missing for me. It sounds a lot like 10cc after Godley & Creme left but the songwriting,lyrics and production just aren't as good as 10cc and Eric Stewart is a much better singer than either of the two lead singers from Supertramp.

 

I might listen to it again but for now I agree with your score of 8 out of 10.

Breakfast in America is a great album! Lots of good sonic symphonies, particularly 'The Logical Song' of course, but there's some excellent soundscapes throughout, 'Lord Is It Mine' is wonderful, to pick one.

I bought The Logical Song, appropriately, while I was touring the South-West USA in '79, and loved it more at the time than I do now. In my current chart as it was selling on itunes a few weeks back is probably the best track, other than the lead single, Goodbye Stranger. I've never got round to buying the album though even though I liked Supertramp from day one. Day One being the fabulously quirky Dreamer, still the best track of their career. I agree with Rollo's assessment that 10CC and ELO were the Grade One's and Supertramp overall were not in the same league, prob why I've never bothered to buy this album even though it sold bucketloads.

 

Led Zeppelin - Led Zeppelin IV

 

The fourth album by Led Zeppelin has a lot of very intriguing history behind it. For one, it doesn't actually officially have a name and instead was represented by four symbols as chosen by the members of the band (see what you think), due to the negative critical response to the last album and to confound them, it's somewhat difficult to identify it because of this but generally the title given is the one associated with it. The album was mainly recorded in a country house Headley Grange and the remote setting allowed them a lot of creative freedom and ability to experiment with different styles, as well as inspiring the somewhat wild and epic country flavour in the lyrics. They also included other musicians such as Sandy Denny and Rolling Stones pianist, Ian Stewart. Despite their refusal to play to the record company's expectations with both the title and cover art and refusing to release what many saw as the album's highlight as a single (have a guess which that might be...), it sold very well, with 37 million sold worldwide and is frequently listed amongst the greatest ever.

 

...Guess what that single was yet? Of course it's Stairway to Heaven, that being the one song I was familiar with on the album somewhat disadvantaged the album from the start as it's not an especially long album anyway at just eight tracks and it's that rare example of a song so majestic, iconic, grand and epic that you find yourself listening to other songs just waiting for it to come, calling it their magnum opus feels like it isn't praising it enough. I guess I can see why they hate playing it now as it doesn't even give anything else by them a chance, it's that iconic. Anyway they didn't release it as they wanted people to buy the album and it worked so I'll try and comment fairly on the other tracks - and thankfully this is an album that's worth all the praise, as there is just about everything you could expect from Led Zeppelin here - iconic riffs, screeching vocals, intense, lush soundscapes and drawing on the fantasy and sublime in lyrics to create add to their overall mysticism. The latter they mainly do through the Misty Mountain Hop, inspired by Tolkien's The Hobbit and contrasting with student and police conflicts over drug possession, and the Tolkien references continue in The Battle of Evermore, drawing on the Scottish Independence wars and a duet with Sandy Denny which sounds really quaint and unique with the mandolin opening and quiet, worldly feel. There is another acoustic moment in Going to California, a Joni Mitchell-esque track that is beautifully atmospheric. But really, it is all about the iconic riffs and there's plenty of them, Black Dog, Rock & Roll, Four Sticks, those riffs stick in the brain for days and never lose their sense of energy which gives them a pretty timeless sound even today. Their cover of When the Levee Breaks also benefits from some wonderful homemade drum effects and delay effects unit.

 

As I'm finding with quite a few of these 70s rock albums, it does get a little samey in places and ofc. after Stairway... hits, you're just so bowled over that nothing on the second side can even come close BUT the pure strength and power of the guitar riffs and experimental, mystical ways of the songs always keeps your attention and it's an album that really got much better with repeated listens. If you want a great picture of Led Zeppelin at their anthemic, heaviest best, then look no further~

 

8.5

Never bought a Led Zep album - my best friend tried to convert me in 1971 to the cause when I was more into his Monkees records, and it was such an assault of noise it put me off them for decades. Plus they got no daytime radio play, so the only track of theirs I knew was the TOTP theme tune. I came round in the end, but have stuck with the Mothership Compilation album of their greatest material and have no ambitions to go beyond that. Stairway To Heaven is epic, Rock & Roll fab and another 2 tracks are on Mothership, so that leaves just 4 I don't have.....

Same here,I only know three of their songs. I did listen to some of their albums on youtube a few years ago (they weren't on Spotify at that time). They were OK but not really my sort of thing.

When I met up with the family at the weekend (for the first time since lockdown and the last until who knows when) my sister (who is even older than I am) was lamenting the fact that her sons (16 and 20) insisted on listening to Led Zep on the way down :lol:

 

I've never been a huge Led Zep fan although Stairway is of course a classic. Whole Lotta Love is very familiar as the TOTP theme (albeit not their version) and then there is Kashmir, another great song.

Led Zep IV is a very good album and the only one I own by them.

When I met up with the family at the weekend (for the first time since lockdown and the last until who knows when) my sister (who is even older than I am) was lamenting the fact that her sons (16 and 20) insisted on listening to Led Zep on the way down :lol:

 

*.* Your nephews have good taste it seems x

 

-x-

 

 

 

De La Soul - De La Soul is Dead

 

Despite what it appears, this is only the second album released by hip hop group, De La Soul. Much of the album’s themes and concepts come from the rejection by the group of the perception of them as ‘Hip Hop hippies’ with the general positive and anti-gangsta theme of their debut, 3 Feet High and Rising. Like the first album, it contains many skits and makes predominant use of sampling (over 100 songs in fact). This album actually isn’t available on streaming (presumably because of the amount of copyright laws they’ve broken with this!) so this was actually the first album I had to buy physically, and they were pretty hard to get hold of too, I had to get a used version on Amazon, but I’m extremely pleased I did!

 

This is one of the strangest, unique yet wonderful hip hop albums I’ve ever heard. There’s just about every mood, style, sample, experiment with structure and skit possible present here, you truly never know what you’re about to get next. I for one am extremely happy to have a more group that rejects the gangsta persona and acknowledges the dangers it brings, but while they resent being called hippies, they succeed in a having a darker tone yet still a very amusing, satirical and postmodern take on the genre which to me sounds incredible. This is the first hip hop albums I’ve heard where the skits aren’t cringey or dreadful, and there’s a LOT of them on this album, the main scenario following a bunch of thugs listening to the album and exasperating at the lack of curse words and pimps common in the rap genre, but there’s also a radio station called WRMS that plays nothing but De La Soul music, which does fit in a few satirical takes on the genre. They actually feel smart and well thought out and not just crass and in-jokey like the likes of Dr Dre or Eminem's did. It helps that the music is great itself, sometimes very socially conscious and hard hitting like Millie Pulled a Pistol on Santa (the ‘Santa’ in this case being her Dad working as one, after he constantly sexually abuses her and no one believes her) & Who Do U Worship and My Brother’s a Basehead which gives gritty and blunt reality of life on the streets, as well as the genre-riffing Afro Connections at Hi-5, but other times, just straight out absurdist fun like the gender rap battle Bitties in the BK Lounge and Fanatic of the B Word (that being ‘Baseball’). There are also some wonderfully old school sample-heavy songs like Keepin’ The Faith & A Roller Skatin’ Jam Named Saturdays that could be hits for any artist, but fit in with their sample-heavy trademark sound very well. Even their interludes like Talkin’s Bout Hey Love are well produced.

 

This album really gets it all right even if it's somewhat tonally all over the place, yet it doesn’t matter as it’s just so wonderfully self-aware. There’s the hard-hitting social consciousness paired with satire on the genre, piss-taking of their fellow stars and fans and it’s so diverse and juxtaposing in style it will always keep you interested even at an hour and a quarter long. I’m just sad that their music isn’t available on streaming and so rare to find these days that they may end up being lost to time. I really hope they get past the legal barriers that are against them and this is the type of interesting and unique hip hop that really stands out in the genre and shouldn’t be forgotten. I don’t know how I’m going to take the upcoming hip hop albums seriously after this!

 

9.5

It's tragic that De La Soul is basically wiped from musical history due to the samples and new formats involving a legal nightmare. They were great, and also suffer the fate of most acts who are smart, witty, incisive and not in-ya-face: under-appreciation. The pop biz is littered with them, from 10CC, Eels, Divine Comedy, Prefab Sprout, Squeeze and so many more.

Indeed, they were actually really close to having them on streaming last year, but then more roadblocks came :( The streaming youth of today are missing out~

 

-x-

 

 

Wu-Tang Clan - Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)

 

East Coast, hardcore hip hop may have reached it's critical peak with Nas' Illmatic and Notorious B.I.G's Ready to Die, but a year before, this one arguably set the standard for many minimally produced, gritty rap troupe diss battles for years to come. Wu Tang Clan consist of nine members all of whom with such butchered spellings I can't be bothered to type them out, but all managed to become big names in the industry following the recognition this received. Produced on a very low budget in a cramped studio, the album makes use of influences from Chinese philosophy and Martial arts films from the 80s such as Enter the Dragon and The 36th Chamber of Shaolin which inspired the title and there are many sound clips and effects from similar moves throughout, as well as spar battles going back and forth between the nine of them. It was highly influential and sold fairly well despite it's anti-mainstream sound and is seen as one of the greatest hip hop albums of all time.

 

So yeah, this is about as far from the type of thing I usually listen to as physically possible so was expecting this to be one I respect what it did, but wasn't for me. I guess these hip hop albums are sticking with me though as I actually found quite a lot to enjoy here. Even now, this is a very daring and raw album that wouldn't be the kind of thing anyone would've been expecting and you have to give them credit as despite how weird it is, it's a little overlong, braggadocio and all the songs follow the same basic template of rap verse over a minimalist beat, but they all have a good flow and distinctive style between the nine of them and there is the odd 'intermission' or skit that is terrible as always, but the Eastern martial arts movies and pop culture references and general fun style of the album does make it quite endearing and unique. Generally the fast paced lyrics aren't the most deep, but these were clearly inner city, deprived people so the social commentary in some of the tracks is very effective and even more so when you think this could so easily have failed and they could've gone back to that. C.R.E.A.M, the only one I kind of knew before this album, is a highlight and over a wonderful sampled piano melody, tells the story of the deprived upbringings of the rappers and how hard money was to come by. Likewise, Can It All Be So Simple and Tearz (the former accompanied ominously by gunshot effects and an apt sample of Gladys Knight's The Way we Were) are very notable in their anger and sadness at the mafioso lifestyle. The album is truly unfiltered and the serious moments are few and far between which makes them stand out. Not that the constant pop culture references, shaolin sword references and rap battles aren't fun as well, Method Man I'm pretty sure was a template for things like Epic Raps Battle of History to take the piss out of with it's Dr Seuss references.

 

This, along with Nas, feels a very pure hip hop kind of album, and the lack of glossy production and unfiltered and strange nature of the lyrics does really give a home-made, endearing style that could only come about once in a career. It's certainly not for everyone, especially at running over an hour with some songs almost at the seven minute mark, it really wears out quickly, but you have to look at the context and appreciate that this was nine guys on a limited budget doing what they loved and given what it inspired, it's an interesting, eclectic listen to this day and hearing it does make you appreciate how much it did for the still budding genre.

 

8.0

 

Green Day - American Idiot

 

After a period of disappointing sales, Green Day really had to turn things around for their seventh studio album and they seemed like they had done it with the album Cigarettes and Valentines...until the master tapes were stolen essentially rendering the whole project unworkable so the band completely started over and took on an ambitious project of a concept album and rock opera. It follows the story of Jesus of Suburbia, a lower middle class adolescent who hates his town and decides to move to the city where he meets St. Jimmy, an anarchic freedom fighter who proves his opposite and a part of his subconsciousness and Whatsername, who is the nemesis of St. Jimmy and seen as the 'Mother of Revolution'. The plot is...pretty unclear in general, but the gist is he meets these two characters which makes him follow a certain path, eventually killing St. Jimmy and losing contact with Whatsername and returning to his middle class life. The band admittedly ran out of steam with the plot so left it open to interpretation exactly what happened, what it did capture was the voice of those left in the dark by the Bush administration and disillusioned with the political climate in the wake of 9/11 and the Iraq War, and was largely responsible for ushering in a new period of rebellion and Anti-Bush sentiments that weren't all that common before (The Dixie Chicks learnt the hard way). It was not only a revival but remains their career high point, selling sixteen million copies worldwide and even inspiring a Broadway musical adaptation.

 

What an album, it's incredible how well this has held up over the years and easily contains some of their most iconic songs ever and the political parallels compared to today are so glaring, but before all that, this is one I always loved, my brother was a big fan and has played this a lot, so I had heard most of it before, but it remains such an epic listen. I've already said that the story doesn't really make a lot of sense overall, but really it's the themes and capturing of the voice of a forgotten generation that makes this such an incredible listen. The title track really needs no introduction and the fact it has acquired a whole new meaning over the years shows how timeless it remains, the other singles are all great and pretty ubiquitous - Boulevard of Broken Dreams' tragic, lighters-in-the-air moroseness and Holiday's true anarchic edge, as well as Wake Me Up When September Ends which takes a break from the main narrative to give a heartfelt tribute to Billy Joel Armstrong's father who died when he was ten, it still brings a tear to my eye. But outside the singles, the whole album has a lot to offer as well. It's all very stadium-centric which may not please 'purists', but they've never sounded so huge. With nine minute five part suites like Jesus of Suburbia and Homecoming that really capture the rampaging emotions of the lead character and show some of the more daring experiments with form, the lyrical content throughout is pretty bleak but they sell it in such an anthemic and singalong that you can't help but feel inspired as well as sad about it.

 

It's amazing how well this album has held up, and it's pretty clear to see why if you look at the current political landscape, while songs like American Idiot do certainly feel ever so relevant in the Trump era, it's also not hard to see why this album may have led to him getting elected, while that definitely wasn't their intention (they have said as much), it was just so good at capturing that lost voice that gets overlooked by the government and how it can lead to sometimes, even worse things. It's not a new sentiment, since punk first came about in the 70s, it's been there, but they really got it at the right time when this pro-American post 9/11 world and it remains such an important album now as much as then. With epic guitar rock as this, it'd be a great album anyway and I am definitely clouded a lot by nostalgia for this rating, but for how well it holds up, I think if there's any modern day rock masterpieces you should take a listen to, it's this one.

 

10

American Idiot is brilliant. Love that it was built out of its current political climate (and if anyone who felt left behind by the government was 'radicalised' by this album, then they definitely got the wrong message from it if they ended up voting for Trump), the long tracks that are built on the concept are highlights, adding a political message adds a lot of weight to it all and it definitely makes something of Green Day who are a fairly average rock band aside.

Work is as expected taking it's toll on this, appreciate the continued interest!

 

-x-

 

 

A Tribe Called Quest - The Low End Theory

 

The second studio album from the US Hip Hop group, it was a departure from their debut and featured a minimalist sound that combines bass, drum breaks and jazz samples and featured various social commentary and wordplay between key members, Q-Tip and Phife Dawg. While initially it wasn't too much of a success, the release of further singles solidified it as a popular choice and was eventually certified Platinum, It is also regarded as a classic in alternative hip hop, Quest, like their contemporaries De La Soul, were a part of the Native Tongues rap movement, a primarily Afrocentric collection of artists whose lyrics generally had a more positive and thoughtful mindset than those of the gangsta genre and predominant use of sampling, and this manner largely continued, though there was a lot more of a dark feel. It is still regarded as an example of a fluid fusion of Jazz and Hip Hop and was notably one of the first appearances of Q-Tip's protégé, Busta Rhymes.

 

Another album from the early days of hip hop, this one is in a similar category to De La Soul is Dead as it's a bit more witty, less raw and more sample focused than the likes of Dr Dre and Wu Tang Clan. I wouldn't say it's quite as good as De La Soul's one on the list, but tbh given I knew very little of A Tribe Called Quest's music before, it was pretty good. One of the strengths is definitely the really good flow that comes from Q-Top and Phife Dawg (sadly deceased now), they have very different styles in rapping, Q-Tip's being a much lower pitch and having much more poetic and reflective lyrics and Phife has a much more battle rap ready voice that would fit well to the gangsta style, Check the Rhime is a good example of how it really works with it's great jazzy trumpets interplaying with their wordplay and relentless swapping of the mic, but while the flow and beats are great, the lyrics are a strength. Show Business is a very sardonic and cutting take on the music industry featuring many guest rappers giving their own takes and it's as big a stick up to the corporate interference as you can expect, a timeless topic. Other highlights include Everything is Fair with a great use of a sample and a highlight of Q-Tip's solo numbers, Skypager is a short number that has some wonderful horn instrumentation and What? is a beautifully written piece that is a series of questions going from seemingly comical to more profound such as 'what is hip hop without violence' or 'what are the youth if they ain't rebellin'?' Album closer, Scenario, ofc. contains some great verses with the instantly recognisable Busta Rhymes, I'm not always a fan, but he certainly dominates this as well as the anthemic chorus.

 

It's certainly an album that I found came alive a lot more in the second half, but throughout it's a very well produced and well lyricised effort and I can certainly see why it's a classic. I have to compare if I'm listening to this many albums of the same genre and I don't think it quite reaches the innovative, genre-spanning heights of De La Soul, but still, that's not exactly the album's fault. You can certainly tell this was the product of a lot of thought and innovation and the production, though minimal, does always stay interesting enough to keep you hooked on the songs as well. I'd really recommend this if you haven't heard it, it's smarter than average hip hop that you can still bop along to~

 

8.5

I don't know much about A Tribe Called Quest bar Can I Kick It (yes you can!) but that was a goodie, and any comparisons with De La Soul would make me want to hear more :)

Still haven't forgotten about this! Half term starts from next Friday (which I cannot WAIT for) so I should be able to do more than a couple a week then (I should say I have finished the actual list, just need to write them up)

 

-x-

 

 

The Notorious B.I.G. - Ready to Die

 

Ready to Die was the debut album released from the short lived but highly influential Christopher Wallace, better known as the Notorious B.I.G., tragically the title remains quite fitting in this case as it was the only album released in his lifetime, his second being released just sixteen days after his murder in 1997. It is a partly autobiographical album that tells his stories of being a young criminal right from his year of birth. It birthed three big hits and was a highly influential and critically praised album in East Coast Hip Hop, being released the same year as Nas' Illmatic in a very big year for the genre that made it compete with the West Coast dominance that was reigning supreme.

 

The very few songs I know from B.I.G aren't on here, so this album was mainly a total discovery. I'm not lying when I saw this album is autobiographical and it's a pretty unique concept, this album opens with an audio re-enactment of his mother giving birth which...I get it, it fits in with the concept but it's really not too pleasant to listen to. I have rather enjoyed all the hip hop albums so far but with the length of this album and the return of those dreaded godawful skits, I didn't have high hopes but actually this is one of the best I've heard. Despite being so young at the time, Biggie had clearly lived quite the life here and it's all here, unfiltered and brutally honest, not all of it's pleasant to listen to, but it never loses your attention. The album title is of course very fitting considering what happened, but it showed that it never even came as a surprise to Biggie, and you can see why, because his life was filled with the full gangsta lifestyle, and majority of this album has some pretty dark and angry feel with lots of violent imagery, yet with some polished production make it at the same time, something you can bop to. Gimme the Loot is particularly a very cinematic styled tale of a bank robbery which ends with gunshots, the funk-laden, danceable Machine Gun Funk & the more slower Warning both have very contrasting tones, lyrics and tempos and flow very well into each other and are both real highlights, and the inclusion of atmospheric sounds and dialogue in both add to the cinematic feel of the album, and it's not all doom and gloom, because as awful as this lifestyle may seem, he did have some moments of enjoyment. One of the more famous songs on the album, Juicy, is a good example of a fun and infectious number with a really good sample and has all the hallmarks of a hip hop classic and Me & My Bitch has some wonderful dramatic strings. It's not all good though, and not in the sense that we just can't comprehend such a lifestyle, but just that's it's really quite unpleasant and immoral. One More Chance particularly is one of the most misogynistic songs I've heard with the chorus sampled from Jackson 5's Want You Back and has an absolutely AWFUL skit showing in detail the sex with a missus and his 'bitch' (as he charmingly refers to every woman on here) is begging HIM for another chance, I had to skip it.

 

Thankfully the ending of the story is one of the highlights, Suicidal Thoughts is a haunting song that ends with Biggie supposedly committing suicide while his mentor and friend, Sean Combs AKA Puff Daddy begging him to reconsider before chillingly going quiet. While it wouldn't end that way, it is quite a fascinating album to listen to not only in seeing a highly personal account of living in Inner City, impoverished New York and the brutal reality of the ways to survive, but with how at any minute, he knew and even was willing to lose his life. As tragic as that is for one so young as he clearly was very talented, this does add to the real raw power of the album and that hasn't waned as, inevitably as he seemed to think, that day came. Despite the misogynistic moments and the length, it is definitely an album I would recommend. It's got a real raw power and storytelling ability that many have not matched and really highlights why he has such a legacy with such a short life.

 

9.0

 

The Strokes - Is This It

 

(I don't know what our stance with Google/advertising is right now so keeping the clean cover just in case we get taken down, ofc. you will know the album better for having this cover)

 

One of the most influential and important albums of the 21st Century now released right at the wake of the century. At a time when technology and electronics were booming in music, The Strokes' sought to get a much more stripped down and simplified, raw sound as a throwback to a type of guitar music that had fallen out of fashion as the century drove to a close, with lyrics focusing on urban youth lives and most music taken in live takes. Being released just before the events of 9/11, this did result in a fair bit of changes made to the album including completely leaving off the track, New York City Cops, as well as the now iconic cover image of, gasp, a bare bottom on a woman being having to be replaced with a cleaner version. Despite this, it was an instant critical and commercial success, with many praise being directed at it's throwback to the 1970s Garage rock sound and raw yet melodic indie-pop/rock. It was largely seen as the key album that influenced guitar bands in the 2000s and caused a revival in both the UK and the US of the more gritty urban rock sound (AKA 'landfill indie').

 

I had always heard about this album and was very interested to hear it, I wasn't sure if I'd heard any Strokes songs before this as for as influential as this album was, they did gradually decline after the mid-century and while some of these songs are familiar, I can't say I knew them by name. Anyway, I was a big fan of mid 00s guitar pop and while I don't listen to it as much these days, I was very interested in hearing this and sure enough, you can really trace so many of the likes of Arctic Monkeys, Franz Ferdinand, Libertines, Kings of Leon etc. back to this sound and that's a very good thing. This album isn't exactly the most diverse thing ever, but there was a clear point to it - ignoring the rise of technology and going back to basics as a throwback to the greats of the genre, it's timeless and I'm not surprised it struck a chord and I'm sure it still would whenever it arrived. The songs are all short, fast-paced indie pop songs with Julian Casablancas' distinctive drawl and twin guitar swipes and pleasingly low on the theatrics, you could hum any of the songs on here. The best examples are probably the singles, nothing against the album tracks they're just more of the same, Last Nite, Hard to Explain with it's anthemic guitar and (I'm so glad I listened to this now and not at the time if this track was banned) New York City Cops with it's timely themes, singalong chorus and simple message that withstands, It's interesting to see how oversensitive people were at the time but I'm glad it's found a voice since.

 

If there's one drawback to listening to this late, it's that the sound has been somewhat done to death since it's release and through no fault of it's own, it seems a bit one note with not much variation on the surface, but ofc. they weren't to know how much it caught on and there's still an authenticity and clear intent when releasing this album that makes it very endearing. I've always been interested in one of the main influences behind this sound, being one of the main genres I grew up with and got into when I first explored music. It was an infectious and fun listen that is possibly a bit simplistic by today's standards, but serves as the closest thing to patient zero when it comes to 2000s alternative rock.

 

8.0

ooh look, it's a buzzjack friendly one xo

 

 

Spice Girls - Spice

 

This is gonna be a more spread out version of the one I did in the Lounge thread but if you're interested...Spice was the first album from the Spice Girls, a group that need no introduction. Five girls with not a whole lot of musical experience but very big and distinctive personalities, so much they were even given names based on them - Sporty, Baby, Scary, Ginger and Posh - took the world by storm in the late 90s in a way that was comparable to Beatlemania, and riding the third wave of feminism and ushering in a new pop sound still prevalent today. Though many see the album as what brought in a new wave of manufactured pop girl and boy groups, the girls did have a high level of involvement in the songwriting and vision, before all the product placement and movie tie-ins, they had to prove themselves worthy and, sales-wise at least, it certainly did, becoming the world's best selling album of 1997, going to number 1 in 17 countries and the best selling album ever by a girl group. The singles fared just as well, spawning four UK number 1s and worldwide hits.

 

So yeah, I wouldn't call myself a huge fan of the Spice Girls, but even as a young toddler, they were one of the first groups I distinctly remember at the time, probably due to all the product placement, but I give them credit, they definitely knew how to write an incredible pop song, and a lot of them has aged really well for how short lived as a group they were. Wannabe is a perfect debut, so filled with personality and hooks, it's a masterful opening statement and you just knew when hearing that that they were certainly worth paying attention for, and they proved they weren't one trick ponies with the other singles coming very close - for me, Who Do You Think You Are is just as good if not better, so much fun and a joy to listen to and I can definitely appreciate Say You'll Be There and 2 Become 1 as well. But what of the ones not everyone knows? Well, it's a mixed bag overall. There are some songs on here that come close, Love Thing has some great hooks as does Something Kinda Funny, If You Can't Dance additionally has some interesting latin influences in there, and then....let's just say, they were always best when they were having fun (Viva Forever aside of course <3), the ballads here leave a lot to be desired. Mama is sweet, but too long and Naked is a real mess of a song, It's clearly trying to hit the right emotional notes, but it just doesn't work, the occasional vocal splits don't help. Oh yes, don't go expecting great singing either, Baby, Sporty and Scary have distinctive voices, and Sporty in particular is clearly a standout vocal, but I have a real problem picking out Ginger or Posh's vocals, and with the latter, it's probably not too surprising given her vocal range oops.

 

Overall, It's a little dated and I can't really claim this is particularly great or ground-breaking music and certainly compared to what I've heard in this list, a bit weak. However, I do see the reason for it's place here. Like I said, the context behind it will certainly make you appreciate it more and considering none of them had any prior musical experience, they definitely didn't do half bad here and certainly proved themselves adept at charisma and catchy hooks, even if the more sentimental moments didn't reach the same heights, and it did inspire more normal, teen, bubblegum pop to grow an audience more and more importantly, allowed girl bands to really step up. All this means that while I may not listen to it again, it was in many ways a very important cultural moment and one that you can still tell why.

 

7.0

Of the last two I'd rather listen to Spice as an album, I like variety of sound and inventiveness over attitude and a recognisable copyright "sound", but The Strokes did a good job at spearheading guitar band revival. Their best track was reptilia (2004 chart-topper for me) Mel C has continued to be a regular goodie, her solo career is on a par with the Spice Girls, who were great fun, when taken as a whole.