ITT: /mu/ in 1977
Thank god that âpunkâ nonsense from last year is over
>intentionally pushed to #1 on the UK chart so "God Save The Queen" didn't reach the toplol
VISIONS OF SWASTIKAS IN MY HEAD
>>131691952don't trigger it
can't believe Leo Sayer sold out to Amerifat radio slop
IMPEACH JIMMY CARTER!
Punk blows. Why are the music mags so obsessed with pushing this rubbish?
>>131692068t. Keith Emerson
Timid little album
Aficionados complain that her sellout has become audible, but while I admit that the cute squeals on "Applejack" are pure merchandising, she's always been willing to sell what she couldn't give away. I think Dolly has made the pop move a lot more naturally than, say, Tanya Tucker. The problem here afflicts every genre: material. Bâ
Fuck the Eagles and KISS. Rock is dead.
Having concealed his ego in metaphor as a young songpoet, Joel achieved success when he uncloseted the spoiled brat behind those bulging eyes. Here, the brat appears only once, in the nominal guise of "the stranger." The rest of Billy has more-or-less grown up. He's now as likable as your once-rebellious and still-tolerant uncle who has the quirk of believing OPEC is a plot to ruin his air-conditioning business. B-
YOU MAKE ME FEEL LIKE DANCINGI WANNA DANCE THE NIGHT AWAY
>>131692135>>131692246I'm convinced this is the guy that makes all these year threads. Man, this board is in fucking limbo.
>>131692316ugh, the worst
>>131692316Fucking makeup-wearing clown rock for 6th graders.
I'm not feeling Carter. Dude's a disappointment.
People who think this is a one-joke band aren't going to change their minds now. Those who enjoy the joke appreciate it for its wit, economy, power, and speed. Hint: Read the lyrics. A
New York's dangerous as shit these days. Be careful if you head down there, folks.
THE ANGEL IN YOUR ARMS AROUND YOUIS GONNA BE THE DEVIL IN SOMEONE ELSE'S ARMS TONIGHT
man i love gommunism
The first encounter.
ON A DARK DESERT HIGHWAYTHE COOL WIND BLOWING IN MY HAIR
ASHRA - NEW AGE OF EARTH (FULL ALBUM)https://youtu.be/8plQdob4JP8?is=bUrnynKA6jjVUWij
Wait a second--wasn't this a quartet? D+
>>131692246Billy Joel honestly really sucks.
>>131692646these dudes are kinda weird. not sure i'm into them. where's all the songs about cars and girls?
>>131692106If thatâs timid, this is outright scared
Why is this easy-listening rock different from all other easy-listening rock, give or take an ancient harmony or two? Because myths of love lost and found are less invidious (at least in rock and roll) than myths of the road? Because the cute-voiced woman writes and sings the tough lyrics and the husky-voiced woman the vulnerable ones? Because they've got three melodist-vocalists on the job? Because Mick Fleetwood and John McVie learned their rhythm licks playing blues? Because they stuck to this beguiling formula when it barely broken even? Because this album is both more consistent and more eccentric than its blockbuster predecessor? Plus it jumps right out of the speakers at you? Because Otis Spann must be happy for them? Because Peter Green is in heaven? A
They still haven't gotten the message that it ended three years ago.
Lol, they sound like ladies.This'll never catch on
And so, as they say at the end of certain cartoons, that's all, folks.
>>131692736Stevie is hot.
Ted Nugent may have turned into a living cartoon, but better cartoon carnivores than cartoon vegans and better the Kiss impersonation of today than the Robin Trowers of yesteryear. Ted's no more sexist than Kiss and he sings better. Ten fast, simple, stupid songs for guitar, voice, and shoutalong, four or five of which ought to keep anybody under 25 awake on the interstate for half an hour. B+
>>131692834Mckvie is best girl
>>131692876>>131692721>>131692135Hey now, put down the moonshine jug, Cletus.
>>131692818She hasn't apparently gotten the message that it ended 20 years ago.
A friend who loves this record has offered the attractive theoretical defense that it combines the two late strains of rock minimalism--jazzy synth hooks and three-chord barrage. So many it will prove attractive for theoreticians. For the rest of us, however, there are little problems such as lurid production, the way it treats serious political problems as rhetoric, and how this duo's manic live performance turns into silliness on record. C
>>131692971ah what do you know about anything, Bob?
Less than three months after its release, the Ringo fan in me dutifully played this for a third and last time. Whereupon the journalist began to wonder how many people were buying such dreary music just because it was by a Beatle. And was both saddened and pleased to learn that the answer, for all practical purposes, was no one--it never got higher than 199 in Record World, which I'll bet was some statistician paying his respects. D
>>131693011Someday you'll get your own identity instead of mouthing your brother's songs or else die of a drug overdose, Andy, whichever one comes first.
>>131693056This is so bad. Afterwards they didn't even bother releasing his albums in the US anymore.
>>131692736way way overrated album tbqh
The most obnoxious band currently making a killing on the zonked-teen circuit, not to be confused with Mahogany Rush, who at least spares us the reactionary gentility. Instead, imagine a power-trio Kansas or Angel or Uriah Heep with the vocals cranked up an octave. Or two. D+
Ha ha oops.
>>131693180SHE'S MIGHTY-MIGHTY
...
>>131693268it's rumored that many of her critics are dead by 1990 of a mysterious illness
No, I have not shorted out or fallen in love with a cyborg. No, I do not like Kraftwerk's previous craft-work, Radio-Activity, which consists mostly of bleeps. But this shares with Autobahn a simple-minded air of mock-serious fascination with melody and repetition. Plus its textural effects sound like parodies by some cosmic schoolboy of every lush synthesizer surge that's ever stuck in your gullet--yet also work the way those surges are supposed to work. Plus the cover and sleeve photos are suitable for framing. Aâ
>>131693243god i hate this faggot so much
>>131693268Nuts to this hateful cunt.
A blast from the past is back for one last go.
>>131693416https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eVuNjF0hS0Too bad her voice sounds a little rusty, or maybe she's turning into Rosemary Clooney lol.
This was gonna turn into her annual sultry cornpone when A&R man Jerry Wexler opined "You know, you would do better with songs people Recognize. How about a Bee Gees tune, maybe that wonderful Sam Cooke song the Stones covered once? And who can go wrong with 'Higher and Higher'?" And it almost works, too, except that those of us with a long enough memory can still hear the originals. It takes a special kind of stupid to turn "Higher and Higher" into a downtempo. C
Having revealed how much you can take out and still have rock and roll, they now explore how much you can put back in and still have Ramones. Not that they've returned so very much--a few relatively obvious melodies, a few relatively obvious vocals. But that's enough. Yes, folks, there's something for everyone on this ready-made punk-rock classic. Stoopidity, both celebrated and satirized. Love (thwarted) and social protest (they would seem to oppose DDT). Inspired revivals (the Trashmen) and banal cover versions (Bette Midler and Cass Elliott beat them to "Do You Wanna Dance?"). And, for their record company and the ears of the world, an actual potential hit. If "Sheena Is a Punk Rocker" was the most significant number eighty-four in history, what will "Rockaway Beach" do for number twenty? (Did I hear five?) A
>*dies on the toilet
>>131693485come on, her Higher and Higher isn't that bad. it's actually kind of cute.
F
>>131692692The title cut may be their best song ever, challenging a formula that even apologists are apologizing for by now with cutting hard rock guitar and lyrics in which Jon Anderson casts aspersions on his own "cosmic mind." But even there you wish you could erase Rick Wakeman and elsewhere Steve Howe has almost as little to say. C
Problem with the high-test riff jobs that powered Rocks is that when it came time to follow up, the band was out of gas. Joe Perry goes nowhere near "Bright Light Fright" while the mould-breaking "Kings and Queens", synthesized medieval pomp-rock (cf. Rush, Styx) proves conclusively that they won't bite "The Hand That Feeds." We knew it all along, guys. C+
>>131693624Wait is this gonna be a disco album? It had better not be.
>>131693643the drugs are starting to get to them by this point
FUCK DISCO AND FUCK THE BEE GEES!
So she can transform Billy Joel into Phil Spector, big deal. She's just another pop singer now, albeit one with a few interesting gimmicks. I ask you: Is the redemption of Billy Joel really befitting work for a cultural heroine? C
>>131693678that's really more next year tbqh
Boz obviously labored over this one, getting every second so right there wasn't a whole lot else left. After multiple listens I'm convinced that the first side is quite tedious and the second quite listenable. But it wasn't worth my trouble or his. B-
>>131693673Columbia kind of pressured them into being the next Led Zeppelin when they didn't really want to be that, they would have been happy being a mid-tier AOR band and eventually the pressure and drugs started dragging them down.
Vocally, this group can't match the Emotions, and the music for some of these songs is undistinguished, but I'll take their hit ("Angel in Your Arms," not to be confused with "Undercover Angel") for its modestly articulate modern moralism, a virtue many of the lyrics here share. Recommended: "Mama's Girl," "You Can Do It." B
>>131693835this OHW act was an early DEI experiment/plant>diversity-coded group with three lesbians--one white, one black, one Latinx>the hit is about how it's ok for women to cheat
When is Led Zeppelin touring again?
Get this straight: no matter what the chicmongers want to believe, to call this band dangerous is more than a suave existentialist compliment. They mean no good. It won't do to pass off Rotten's hatred and disgust as role-playing--the gusto of the performance is too convincing. Which is why this is such an impressive record. The forbidden ideas from which Rotten makes songs take on undeniable truth value, whether one is sympathetic ("Holidays in the Sun" is a hysterically frightening vision of global economics) or filled with loathing ("Bodies," an indictment from which Rotten doesn't altogether exclude himself, is effectively anti-abortion, anti-woman, and anti-sex). These ideas must be dealt with, and can be expected to affect the way fans think and behave. The chief limitation on their power is the music, which can get heavy occasionally, but the only real question is how many American kids might feel the way Rotten does, and where he and they will go next. I wonder--but I also worry. A
>>131693871oh dear. this tour...it never happened.
>>131693666More easy-listening disco, but kind of right.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6EDfV3IJyww
Even when he was Genesis, Gabriel always seemed smarter than the average art-rocker. The music, though mannered, had substance, the lyrical ideas, no matter how received they were, were easier to test empirically than evocations of spaceships on Atlantis. This solo album seems a whole lot smarter than that. But every time I delve beneath its challenging textures to decipher a lyric or two, I come up a little short. B-
>>131692106This has its share of obvious moments. But I can only assume that those who accuse this band of repetitious cynicism are stuck in such a cynical rut themselves that a piece of well-constructed political program music--how did we used to say it?--puts them uptight. Lyrical, ugly, and rousing, all in the right places. B+
>>131693904Page won't put out a DVD box set of this for a very good reason.
>>131692646https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=poK0Ov2aWGgI always use this Irena Matovic person's channel for this one because it's the original vinyl mix not the brickwalled CD reissue from the 90s-00s.
Focusing soulful horns, high-tension harmonies, and rhythms and textures from many lands onto a first side that cooks throughout. Only one element is lacking. Still, unsympathetic as I am to lyrics about conquering the universe on wings of thought, they make me shake my fundament anyway. B+
>>131693904Yes, it did. I saw it in Chicago.Pity about Plant's kid though.
when's Springsteen coming out with another album? it's been two years.
Us? Retire? Not us, not at all. Last year was just a sabbatical and to prove it we're back with our first album in years to not use outside songwriters.
>>131693056No one cares about 60s Taylor Hanson's lame solo albums.
So you've seen the movie--pretty good movie, right?--and decided that this is the disco album you're going to try. Well, I can't blame you. The Bee Gees side is pop music at a new peak of irresistible silliness, with the former Beatle clones singing like mechanical mice with an unnatural sense of rhythm. And the album climaxes on a par-tee even non-discoids can get into, beginning with the best of David Shire's "additional music," then switching almost imperceptibly to something tolerable by MFSB and revving into all 10:52 of the Trammps' magnificent "Disco Inferno." But I find the other two sides unlistenable, mostly because the rest of Shire's additions are real soundtrack-quality stuff--he even discofies Moussorgsky (see Emerson Lake & Palmer) without making a joke on it (compare Walter Murphy on side two). And there's one more problem. While you're deciding to buy this record, so is everyone you know. You're gonna get really sick of it. Maybe you should Surprise Your Friends and seek out Casablanca's Get Down and Boogie instead. B+
I is born.
How much longer are you going to keep doing this, Stanley? Seriously...seriously.
A debut LP will often seem overrefined to habitues of a band's scene, so it's not surprising that many CBGBites felt betrayed when bits of this came out sounding like Sparks or Yes. Personally, I was even more put off by lyrics that fleshed out the Heads' post-Jonathan Richman, so-hip-we're-straight image; when David Byrne says "don't worry about the government," the irony is that he's not being ironic. But the more I listen the more I believe the Heads set themselves the task of hurdling such limitations, and succeed. Like Sparks, these are spoiled kids, but without the callowness or adolescent misogyny; like Yes, they are wimps, but without vagueness or cheap romanticism. Every tinkling harmony is righted with a screech, every self-help homily contextualized dramatically, so that in the end the record proves not only that the detachment of craft can coexist with a frightening intensity of feeling--something most artists know--but that the most inarticulate rage can be rationalized. Which means they're punks after all. Aâ
>>131694456was wondering when someone would post this
The vocals aren't as intense here as on Alone Again, so the tomfoolery seems a little forced, though I hope he keeps trying. But as long as he's not buried in strings, soul choruses, and Peter Allen songs, I don't think he can make a bad album. Will somebody tell Billy Sherrill to withdraw that call to Australia? B
>>131694456>track 1 kicks innot even escaping disco on this one
>>131694251I feel Terry Kath will die. Just a feeling I have.
>>131691917now that Democrats are back in power we'll have some real change
>>131694693Yeah and maybe gay people will finally have rights. Up yours, Anita!
This old gal's back after a three year break.
As a Stones loyalist, I am distressed to report that this documents the Stones' suspected deterioration as a live band, a deterioration epitomized by the accelerating affectation of Mick's vocals. Once his slurs teased, made jokes, held out double meanings; now his refusal to pronounce final dentals--the "good" and "should" of "Brown Sugar," for example--convey bored, arrogant laziness, as if he can't be bothered hoisting his tongue to the roof of his mouth. His "oo-oo-oo"s and "awri-i"s are self-parody without humor. This is clearly a professional entertainer doing a job that just doesn't get him off the way it once did, a job that gets harder every time out. C+
This double album presents a real critic's dilemma--I'm sure it's boring, but I'm not sure how boring. Insofar as it isn't, Jaco Pastorius deserves as much credit as the artiste. Just the way it did on Hejira, his bass enables her to deal with the syntheses that obsess her--melody and rhythm, form and anima. But only on the title cut does he enable her to realize them. Bâ
RIP Elvis
>>131694848>Jennings was arrested by DEA agents in a Nashville recording studio on August 23, 1977 along with his personal secretary Lori Evans, drummer Ritchie Albright, and his manager's assistant Mark Rothbaum for possession and intent to distribute cocaine. His booking agent George Leib managed to distract the agents long enough for Jennings and Evans to flush a bag of cocaine down a toilet. Jennings phoned his wife, country singer Jessi Colter, and told her to get rid of any drugs in the couple's home.>The charges against three of them were soon dismissed--in the case of Jennings and Albright, on October 4 as they had exceeded the 45 day limit of the Speedy Trial Act to file formal charges against them. Rothbaum plead guilty to sending cocaine through the mail and was sentenced to 18 months in Federal prison.
As MOR singles go, "Lay Down Sally" is as good as it gets. But Clapton leaves all the juiciest solos to George Terry, and while three years ago he seemed to be turning into a singer in the manner of Pete Townshend, now he sounds like he's blown his voice. Doing what, I wonder? B-
Hackett bros... I have terrible news.
>>131694971With the exception of "Wonderful Tonight" which I can't stand there's not a bad song here.
>>131692338>>131692361Well, at least they'll never put out a disco song.
I find side one's seven "fragments"--since the two that clock in at less than 2:45 are 1:42 and 2:20, the term must refer to structures rather than length--almost as powerful as the "overlong" tracks on Station to Station. "Such a wonderful person/But you got problems" is definitely a love lyric for our time. But most of the movie music on side two is so far from hypnotic that I figure Bowie, rather than Eno, must deserve credit for it. I mean, is Eno really completely fascinated by banality? B+
Dammit, Herbie.
>>131695106was wondering when someone was finally going to post this
The album opens with the title song, about a Good Redneck, a class-conscious guy who pays his child support and wonders skeptically why he doesn't get ahead. It closes with "I'm a White Boy," about a Bad Redneck, a race-conscious guy who's too proud for welfare but would settle for a rich woman and/or an easy job. These are powerful pieces whether you like them or not, rendered with passionate sympathy and a touch of distance--his strongest in years. The "filler" includes covers from old standbys Williams and Wills and new favorites Delmore and Wells and an envoi to Lefty Frizzell as well as a gospel song and a running song and a sentimental standard that works (for once). Not a bad cut, and Capitol assembled it from the vaults after Haggard bolted for MCA. Why then did Hag himself put out such crap for three years? Aâ
>>131694312I actually like this album. A lot. Iâve owned the vinyl record version of it before. These songs stir up weird emotions in me that I canât explain and I wasnât even alive when this came out or in the 80s.
>>131693278that was written by the bassist's wife but it was a number of years before the group knew this
>>131695237it's easily found in any Goodwill bin as they sold about 60 billion copies and everyone from age 8 to 80 had it back then, exactly as he points out there
>>131694667What do you think he's going to do, blow his brains out?
>>131695369Aerosmith were sober just long enough to realize they shouldn't get in that plane. Tsk tsk.
>three of them in one yearYou're breaking my balls, Herbie.
Painfully crackpot and painfully sung, but also inspired, not least because it calls forth forbidden emotions. For a surrogate teenager to bare his growing pains so guilelessly was exciting, or at least charming; for an avowed adult to expose an almost childish naivete is embarrassing, but also cathartic; and for a rock and roll hero to compose a verbally and musically irresistible paean to Johnny Carson is an act of shamanism pure and simple. As with Wild Honey, the music sounds wrong in contradictory ways at first--both arty and cute, spare and smarmy--but on almost every cut it comes together soon enough; I am especially partial to the organ textures, and I find the absurd little astrology ditty, "Solar System," impossible to shake. As for the words, well, they're often pretty silly, but even (especially) when they're designed to appeal to whatever Brian imagines to be the rock audience they reveal a lot more about the artist than most lyrics do. And this artist is a very interesting case. A
my Army cousin brought this back from Japan. wouldn't it be crazy if they tried selling this stuff in America? ha ha that'll never happen though.
>>131695425their last interesting album
>>131692246Scenes from an Italian Restaurant is a great song and proof that he's not just a jewish nepo baby
>>131692918*sigh*
This wasn't funny five years ago and it's not funny now, guys.
>>131692759at least they aren't still doing album covers about licking buttholes
>>131691917My mother was born this year
The line on Iggy is that this comeback album with Bowie and friends proves his creative power has dissipated. I say bullshit. The Stooges recorded prophetic music, but only some of it was great: because Iggy's skill at working out his musical concept didn't match his energy and inspiration, the attempted dirges fell too flat and some of the rockers never blasted off as intended. Dissipated or not, the new record works as a record. By now, Iggy barbs his lyrics with an oldtimer's irony, which suits the reflective tone Bowie has imposed on the music just fine. In retrospect, it will appear that this was Iggy's only alternative to autodestruct. Not true, perhaps, but retrospect favors artifacts. As do I. Aâ
>>131695591mine was 23
Goodnight sweet prince.
>>131695865dude, this is Christfag slop. please don't listen to it.
After five years they reunited for this one-off.
When I first heard the Enofied instrumental textures on side two, as background music, they struck me as more complex than their counterparts on Low, and they are. Low now seems quite pop, slick and to the point even when the point is background noise; in fact, after I completed my comparison, I began to play it a lot. But what was interesting background on "Heroes" proved merely noteworthy as foreground, admirably rather than attractively ragged. Maybe after the next album I'll get the drift of this one. B+
I've seen Star Wars six times.
>>131696046aw, i've only seen it four
Who cares if the single sells six million? It's only singles, y'know what I mean? Trendsetters don't buy singles. Smart people like you and me don't buy singles. But now I hear the _album_ has gone platinum, too. D-
>>131696137suppose it had to be posted eventually, but wasn't looking forward to being reminded of this one
>>131696137The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, as they say. Yuck.
Although Paul Rothchild edited Bonnie's road band as painstakingly as he did the El Lay pros of Home Plate, this came out sounding unfashionably raw, almost live, because instead of punching in the perfect note and the clean tone he went for the most intense moment available from months of takes. I don't like "Runaway," which is flat and plodding and wrong for her, and I wish there were a stunner like "Good Enough" or "Sweet and Shiny Eyes" here. But Bonnie is singing rougher than ever before. Anyone who can induce me to dance to Eric Kaz has got to be doing some kind of job. Aâ
When I listen closely enough I can tell she sometimes still sings real good. C
>>131696217Raitt was the original trust fund kid of rock.
I've got nothing special against Richard Perry, although he used to find more interesting songs--and songwriters, which since he's now developed his own stable is more relevant. But even when he made interesting records he tended to push the epicenters of eccentric artists toward the middle of the road, and that's not what Diana needs. Her problem isn't her vocal limitations, although she's obviously no Betty Carter, but her blank taste. What if the best of the slick trivia here were combined with, I don't know, a good '30s pop tune done straight, a blues, something obscure by Al Green, something familiar by a non-Motown girl group? Might be worth hearing, and Perry could make it happen. Yeah sure. C+
>>131696434>took him that long to figure out that Ross in fact is just a vessel for other people's songs and has no actual sound of her own
>>131696379gotta admit she can lay down the blues/funk jams though
Albert, man, let's talk retirement.
>>131693056fortunately this is the only Beatle member album this year
Gosh, what a terrific idea--a concept album about a cocksure rock and roller who Cannot Love. How'd all those cliches get in there, I wonder. I mean, the first side works up a very nice groove, although it'll add nothing to Rod's reputation as a composer or a humanitarian. But side two opens with a Vanilla Fudge remake and doesn't recover till the confessional finale, itself festooned midway through with a "Whoo!" so pro forma you'd think Rod had run out of steam. Bâ
You've heard of Beatlemania? I propose xenophobia. C
>>131696710Foreigner fucking sucks, dude.
Charles hasn't sung with such consistent care in years. Not that he's given up his jocund audacity--two of the best cuts here are a miraculous recasting of "Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin'" and a Bobby Charles song first recorded by, fancy that, Joe Cocker. But even on the throwaways he seems to remember the difference between goofing and goofing off. The first side is as listenable as any Charles I know, and I've learned to enjoy myself through the schmaltz of "Be My Love" and get to the easy stuff on side two. Now if only he'd let those Beatle ballads be. Aâ
>>131696634Dammit, Rod, if only you'd ended up in the 27 Club with Jimi and Janis, we'd have been spared from everything that followed.
>>131696488Once you've heard one you've heard them all.
Cute Paul Simon cover. This was also her last stab at contemporary pop.
Always the master craftsman, Newman doesn't waste a second here, doesn't permit an inept lyrical insight or musical fillip. But over the past three years he doesn't seem to have written one song that ranks with his best. Among all these explorations of America's dirty white underbelly, only the out-and-out jokes--the gross intolerance of "Short People" and the Eagles music on "Rider in the Rain"--distinguish themselves. Very disappointing. B+
>>131696862three years since Newman last put out an album. must have been really tough for him.
Most progressive rock is modest schlock that sounds good when played in the background. This is modest schlock that sounds good when slipped into the ear. I guess we should thank Babaji, whichever one he is. B-
See previous remark.
When they start writing songs called "People Who Criticize," you know they're _really_ worried. And the anxiety always comes out in the music. C
>>131692785But he's a dancing man, and he just can't lose!
>>131692409This dude is in love with the smell of his farts.
>>131696002why is it "Heroes" instead of just Heroes?
I'll tell you what kind of street rock-and-roll these bimbos make--when the title cut came on I thought I was hearing Evita twice in a row, only I couldn't seem to figure out why the singer wasn't in tune. C-
If The Idiot exploits the (tranceprone) affinity for the slow rocker that Bowie evinced on Station to Station, this reestablishes the (apollonian) affinity for the dionysiac artist Bowie made so much of five years ago on Mott's All the Young Dudes. Like most rock and rollers, I prefer this to The Idiot because it's faster and more assertive--which means, among other things, that the nihilistic satire is counteracted by the forward motion of the music itself. Aâ
>>131699652This from a self-described male feminist.
This group surprised me live--nowhere near as willing to pander sexually as publicity suggests, and Kim Fowley contributes his first decent tune since "Alley Oop." But Joan Jett's inability to bellow through the wall of noise (she shrieks flatly instead) reminds us that are more generous musical role models for human beings of all sexes than Aerosmith. C
>>131697913In which the group who last winter brought you a $7.95 lp to boycott devotes one side to the wantonness of woman and the other to the doomed-to-life futile rebelliousness of the poor saps (those saps! you saps!) who buy and listen. C-
>>131694732same
>>131699944where would Goodwill bins be without this one?
>>131699944The hit from this one reminds me of why everyone hates Streisand.
I had hopes this might take its place beside one of my favorite country albums, Lefty Frizzell Sings the Songs of Jimmie Rodgers, but Patsy Cline's legacy is a lot narrower than Jimmie's, and Loretta's not quite the singer Frizzell was, either. At forty-one, her voice is thicker than Patsy's was when she died at thirty, and she's a lot more country, especially in her pronunciation--that slight lisp, and the way she distorts the vowels around "r" sounds. On the other hand, she has decent material to work with for once, and her "Why Can't He Be You" is a breathtaking object lesson in the connections between suffering and exaltation. Annoyance: the seven-minute spoken reminiscence that closes the album. B+
>>131700164>At forty-one, her voice is thicker than Patsy's was when she died at thirty, andLoretta was 44 when this was cut. MCA clearly fudging her age a bit.
This new group is great.
>>131700164Think it not so bad. At least we never got to see Patsy make an album with disco strings on it.
Dear Up-and-Comer: OK, pretty good for a country-rock album--more spirited than your second, less inspired than your first. But let me mention a few things. The Atlanta Braves are not, repeat not, ordinarily identified with the Old South. Rain gets to be a pretty tedious symbol of life's tribulations. The road gets to be a pretty tedious symbol of life's changes. And if you want to get away from Dad, well, I know it'd be a lot of trouble to change your name, but maybe you could do a whole album that doesn't refer to him at all. And you could stop doing his songs, too--it's bad luck that the best cut here is the one he wrote, now isn't it? I mean, you really could use a new exemplar. Good luck finding him or her. (Signed) Roll on, Dean. P.S. Not Waylon Jennings, either. B
>>131700285>>131700164country sucks ass. stop listening to it.
Ferry has custom-designed a new line of songs for his solo concept, rather than borrowing from early Roxy or his humble forebears, and especially on side one the stuff is appealingly down-to-earth. But it doesn't go far enough. I used to think Ferry's big problem was the fruity baritone that epitomized his deliberate unnaturalness, but now I think it's the hopeless romanticism of his half-realized dreams. If he ever did convince large numbers of people to care about his obsessions, the result would be nothing more than a rather scary collective escapism. B+
"It's a Lovely Day" is his biggest hit since changing labels, and this compromise between the mush of Making Music and the muscle of Naked and Warm his biggest album. The compromise is an honest one, the success earned. I wish I could say they made me happier. C+
I know why people complain about Tom Verlaine's angst-ridden voice, but fuck that, I haven't had such intense pleasure from a new release since I got into Layla three months after it came out, and this took about fifteen seconds. The lyrics, which are in a demotic-philosophical mode ("I was listening/listening to the rain/I was hearing/hearing something else"), would carry this record alone; so would the guitar playing, as lyrical and piercing as Clapton or Garcia but totally unlike either. Yes, you bet it rocks. And no, I didn't believe they'd be able to do it on record because I thought this band's excitement was all in the live raveups. Turns out that's about a third of it. A+
>>131692721ok so we had to steal from Ted Nugent on track 2
Here's where the pimple comes to a head--if this isn't adolescent angst in its death throes, then Buddy Holly lived his sweet, unselfconscious life in vain. The lyrics offer wit amid heat and power (will "lyric-sheet verse" soon turn into the macho converse of "greeting-card verse"?) and the music pulls out the stops quite knowingly (will Phil Spector soon be remembered as the Rachmaninoff of rock and roll?). Occasionally it seems that horrified, contemptuous laughter is exactly the reaction this production team intends, and it's even possible that two percent of the audience will get the joke. But the basic effect is grotesquely grandiose. Bruce Springsteen, beware--this is what you've wrought, and it could happen to you. Câ
>>131700451art school kid slop
>>131700484Nobody has ever made it more than 5 minutes into this thing before giving up.
This transparent egoist has had a way with a song ever since the Guess Who days, but the hard rock moves always seem to bring out the sexism in him--a sexism especially repellent because it serves as an outlet not for forbidden class animosities but rather for the familiar old arrogance/self-hate. So it's gratifying that his way with a song should desert him this time. C
>>131700580>a sexism especially repellent because it serves as an outlet not for forbidden class animosities but rather for the familiar old arrogance/self-hateso much projection
>>131700866thankfully that cocksucker didn't review this one so we're spared from whatever moronic thoughts he had on it
These guys sound as if they could use a singer.
Look who's back, it's the original country nepo babby for a one-off single. This isn't nearly as good as "Dern Ya" and she's lost that youthful bounce she had back then, but at least there's no risk of Teresa Brewer covering this one.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pcwGnIWNf8
Tony's last new album for a long time to come.
>>131700989>>131700917>>131700285>>131695222Ahem. Country is mostly trash aside from Hank Williams and some Johnny Cash. Please stop posting or listening to it. Thank you.
>>131701078moron
Hazel can really flick his pick, and maybe that's the problem: despite a welcome but misleading cover of "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" and the assistance of his cohorts in the Funkadelic rhythm brigade, most of the time you'd think this was a David Spinozza record. Heavy it ain't. Bâ
>>131691917Holy fuck. Check out this band I saw down on the Pasadena Civic center. Unfucking believable. my buddy taped the show. They are gonna be the next big thing. https://youtu.be/_VuthIU6jl4?si=MB7kdgwH1hwIebiW&t=11
>>131701144What did we learn today, children? Oh right, guitarists are rarely also songwriters.
This seems like your representative 'delicment LP at first, featuring one irresistible and quite eccentric dance cut, other dance cuts that are at moments even more eccentric (including one based on nursery rhymes), bits of inspired jive, bits of plain jive, and an anomalous slow one. But with familiarity the three rhythm hooks that anchor the album start sounding definitive. And never before has George Clinton dealt so coherently with his familiar message, in which the forces of life--autonomous intelligence, a childlike openness, sexual energy, and humor--defeat those of death: by seduction if possible, by force if necessary. A
>>131701778Jazz guitar is garbage, every single one of them sounds like TV ad music.
The first side, recently recorded, is Young's rough-and-tough version of L.A. country rock, featuring a female backup duo called the Bullets and climaxing with "Bite the Bullet," his sharpest cut since "Tonight's the Night." The second is a journey through the past that perhaps should have stayed in the outtake can. On one tune, Neil turns into a salmon while masturbating in front of the fireplace; on another, he and Crazy Horse somehow take the wind out of "Like a Hurricane," which blew everybody away at the Palladium last fall. B+
Goodnight sweet princess.
>>131702015she was a hot piece of ass in the early 50s in spite of her partner >>131701956. too bad she drank herself to death at an early age.
>>131701778why were gypsies a topic in music so much in the 70s
The simultaneous rawness and detachment of this debut LP returns rock and roll irony to the (native) land of Mick Jagger, where it belongs. From a formal strategy almost identical to the Ramones, this band deducts most melody to arrive at music much grimmer and more frightening: Wire would sooner revamp "The Fat Lady of Limbourg" or "Some Kinda Love" than "Let's Dance" or "Surfin' Bird." Not that any of the twenty-one titles here have been heard before--that would ruin the overall effect of a punk suite comprising parts so singular that you can hardly imagine them in some other order. Inspirational Prose: "This is your correspondent, running out of tape, gunfire's increasing, looting, burning, rape." A
>>131702125No reason in particular, nor was it exclusive to the 70s.
Giving her her only US hit, and it was originally supposed to be sung by the Bee Gees.
Like all the best CBGB bands, the Voidoids make unique music from a reputedly immutable formula, with jagged, shifting rhythms accentuated by Hell's indifference to vocal amenities like key and timbre. I'm no great devotee of this approach, which harks back to Captain Beefheart. So when I say that Hell's songs get through to me, that's a compliment: I intend to save this record for those very special occasions when I feel like turning into a nervous wreck. Aâ
>>131702242oh look, yet more lame art school trust fund kid slop
Although Nelson earned his legend as a songwriter, he's turning into a singer now that profit-taking time has come--does broaden one. The amazing thing is that he gets away with it. On this heartfelt if opportune farewell to Lefty Frizzell, his cracks and creaks and precisely conversational timing hold their own against the more conventionally exquisite singing of Merle Haggard or Frizzell himself. Of course, the material doesn't hurt. B+
>>131691917swirly disco strings everywhere this year
>>131702656https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2ow6OZIxdo
>>131702767In all fairness, if he'd done a disco album the results would be just as bad, maybe even worse.
Old Chess man Esmond Edwards acquits himself with honor--the charts are sharp, the sidemen prime, and most of the songs good ones. But the mildness of the two Muddy Waters covers reminds us that King conceived his style as progressive from Muddy's Delta-Chicago gutbucket, and the segue from "Mother Fuyer," the dirtiest traditional blues in the repertoire, to Bill Withers and Brook Benton is disorienting rather than revelatory. Bâ
>>131702726Cuckgau didn't review her many solo albums aside from Winner in You. it's not like they were big sellers or anything, anyway.
>>131701149LADIES AND GENTLEMEN....HERE COMES THE 1980S.
Since the heyday of Chicago blues was midcentury, most of the classic blues LPs are collections of cuts; except maybe for B.B. King's Live at the Regal and Otis Spann's Walking the Blues (oh, there must be others, but let me go on) I can't recall a better blues _album_ than this. The songs run the length of live performances--four of the nine over five minutes--without any loss of intensity, because their intensity depends not on the compression of the three-minute format but on the natural enthusiasm of an inspired collaboration. Waters sings as though his life depended on it, Johnny Winter proves with every note how right he was to want to do this, and James Cotton--well, James Cotton doesn't open his mouth except to make room for the harmonica, which sounds just great. Aâ
James sounds both awake--worth a headline in itself--and in touch; maybe CBS gave him a clock radio for opening an account there. "Handy Man" is a transcendent sex ballad, while "I Was Only Telling a Lie" and "Secret o' Life" evoke comparison with betters on the order of the Stones and Randy Newman, so that the wimpy stuff--which still predominates--sounds merely laid-back in contrast. Best since Sweet Baby James, shit--some of this is so wry and lively and committed his real fans may find it obtrusive. B
>>131702190She was originally supposed to record "How Deep Is Your Love" and the Bee Gees "If I Can't Have You" but Bob Stigwood swapped them.
I'd swear I thought Blondie's Plastic Letters was out in 77 but it was actually 78.
The former Ms. Vanderpool's final LP, continuing her tradition of bad taste cover art, before she signs Sugarhill Gang and unintentionally ruins music forever by opening Pandora's box.
This might achieve a certain species of profundity if what it (supposedly) criticized was schlock. Instead, the synthesizers make Giorgio Moroder sound like Brian Eno and the sci-fi makes Isaac Asimov seem like a deep thinker. Back to the control board. C
>>131691917Kiss fucking rocks, nothing can beat them right now, they re the new american zepp
I like their looks--two pretty-boys balanced off by two ugly-guys--and have no objection to their sound, which recalls the Aerosmith of Rocks. Nor am I shocked that they're not as powerful as the Aerosmith of Rocks, Jack Douglas or no Jack Douglas. But given their harmony singing you think they'd try and be more melodic. Sign of smarts: the way the phrase "any time at all" hooks "He's a Whore." B
Cut of the month is "Love's Unkind," a remake of "Then He Kissed Me" that I prefer to the original for the way its solo saxophone opens a window in the wall of sound. But the Supremes and Dr. Buzzard (and Natalie Cole?) takeoffs are stale if not stuffy, and when Kraftwerk goes to the disco the best you can usually hope for is air conditioning. Bâ
Although Sandy Pearlman used to say the Cult's audience couldn't tolerate any suggestion that the band's laser-and-leathers fooforaw was funny, their parodic side has become progressively more overt. What do today's Cultists think of "Godzilla" ("Oh no there goes Tokyo") or the beerhall intro to "Golden Age of Leather"? I bet some of 'em like laughing at laser-and-leathers, and good. I also bet some of 'em are so zonked they wouldn't get it if John Belushi emceed, and to, er, hell with them. B
The bad music here can't be blamed on Phil Spector's melodies--Cohen has never posed as a particularly tuneful guy himself. And the main thing wrong with Spector's settings, banal though they are, is that they lack doors. Ordinarily, Cohen whispers, murmurs, whines, croaks, and even screams _through_ the music. Here he has to try and sing over it, using more or less normal volume and timbre. Bâ
Nowadays, punk makes it possible to resist hard rock so slickly textured, but with these guys why bother? They don't waste a cut, and permit none of the stupidity or showiness or sentimentality of postheavy and/or postboogie professionalism, either. If only they seemed interested in their well-crafted say-nothing lyrics. B+
>>131699944cute
>>131704196What a well-crafted, say-nothing review.
Although this may be the Dead's best studio album since American Beauty, it runs a distant second, just nosing out the likes of Wake of the Flood, and will convert no one. In fact, it's a good thing Weir-Barlow's "Estimated Prophet" and Lesh-Monk's "Passenger" are the band's best originals in years, because Donna Godchaux's singer-songwriting debut is a disgrace; similarly, it takes a terse, jumping arrangement of "Samson and Delilah" to cancel out (and then some) a questionable "Dancing in the Streets." A confusion of quality also pervades the Garcia-Hunter title suite on side two. It works pretty well musically; for a while, I was ready to turn in the kazoo on "Alligator" for Paul Buckmaster. Then I listened to the lyric, a fable so polite it sent me hustling back to the verbal, vocal, and musical crudities of Anthem of the Sun, which "Terrapin Station" recalls formally. Amazing how all the hard-won professionalism of a decade disintegrates in the face of the sporadic, irresistible inspiration of their lysergic youth. B
>>131704237yeah yeah they can't be 25 forever. we know.
>>131692316>KISSKikeslop made for retarded boomers. They haven't ever made a good song or even a good album and they can't play their instruments to save their nonexistent souls. Literal retard boomerfaggot boomer circus music that needs to die.>>131692154I don't mind The Eagles, at least their music is enjoyable, unlike the "music" of KISS.>>131692246>>131692602Billy Joel is fucking great, what the fuck are you on to think otherwise?
>>131700484This is a great album, what the fuck is that reviewer fuckin' smoking?>>131700545Tell me you're full of shit without actually saying you're full of shit.
>>131696831Rosie's two United Artists albums were a well-meaning comeback+attempt at modern pop (actually the first time she'd done pop since the "Hey There" days) but she'd been out of the game for so long that the world forgot about her and they went almost unnoticed.>>131696710Corporate buttrock garbage.>>131696309Aretha was washed as fuck by this time--overtaken by Millie and Donna and too snobbish to condescend to disco material.>>131696137She was cute but this song deserves all the bile it gets.>>131700949They were broke and literally starving, so CBS told them either take Steve or get out. It wasn't pretty but they did what they had to do.
A Place in the Sun [A&M, 1977]This mainstream synthesis is not without a certain agreeable tension--vocally and instrumentally, these boys do have their licks down. But it's also a demonstration of how today's pop exploits the rhythmic and dramatic clichés of yesterday's black music. Lyrics, too--Cory Lerios and Dave Jenkins are credited as the sole composers of "Raging Fire," in which love lifts them higher than they've ever been before. C
>>131705671>But it's also a demonstration of how today's pop exploits the rhythmic and dramatic clichés of yesterday's black musici'm glad to know people like this have always existed, they just became more visible with social media
>>131703316yeah he was washed. still had enough cred and radio support to reliably have hits on country radio, but he was not at the bleeding edge of music innovation anymore.
>>131693643Cover art done by Al Hirschfeld.>>131693243Accurate. Rush sucks dick.
>>131694456the back side (which i can't post because image limit) credits Tina by her full name of Martina which sounds kinda clunky so i can understand why they started shortening it
>>131692971frankie teardrop is a 10/10 song tho
>>131693643>while the mould-breaking "Kings and Queens", synthesized medieval pomp-rock (cf. Rush, Styx) proves conclusively that they won't bite "The Hand That Feeds." We knew it all along, guys.wut
>>131710131Upset that they sold out to corporate rock, or at least the strawman version of corporate rock that existed in his head.
>>131691938WHATEVERWHATEVERWHATEVEERRRRRRRR
>>131710172corporate rock was the commonly used by critics to mean "band I don't like"
A Fifth of Beethoven [Private Stock, 1977]What a ripoff. Here I was hoping for disco versions of Fur Elise, Claire De Lune, and six Brandenberg Concertii and what do I get instead but eight songs by W. Murphy? Beethoven made great schlock, transcendent schlock, even, but you, Walter, you just make schlock. D+
Simple Dreams [Asylum, 1977]In which Andrew Gold goes off and Pursues His Solo Career, enabling Ronstadt to hire herself a rock and roll band. She's still too predictable--imagine how terse and eloquent "Blue Bayou" would seem if instead of turning up the volume midway through she just hit one high note at the end--but she's also a pop eclectic for our time, as comfortable with Mick Jagger as with Dolly Parton, interpreting Roy Orbison as easily as Buddy Holly. Even her portrayal of a junkie seeking succor from Warren Zevon's "Carmelita" isn't totally ridiculous. And I admit it--she looks great in a Dodger jacket. B+
>>131712611i'm not trading her TD for the original any time soon
Thunder in My Heart [Warner Bros., 1977]That ain't thunder, Leo, it's the pitter-patter of little duds. C
>>131701149Their debut album had been recorded already by now to be released early next year and this was supposed to be their last show before release. They ended up plays a few more but this was a bit of a home coming and likely gacked and krelled to the gills lol
>>131694971Came out late in the year and much like SNF Soundtrack it's more associated with 78 than 77.
>>131693566I don't mind Wakeman's synths. The track would sound kind of bare without them.
>>131701201next album she finally gets good and puts MOR slop behind her
>>131693624https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LW-MyKSqHEUwe've come a long way from her mini-me Wanda Jackson beginnings 21 years ago
>>131703316"Lady" was an awful choice of a single. So slow and dull. Why not track 1 instead?
