#251: X - Wild Gift (1981)

Zack: This album didn’t make me feel as many emotions as I expected. I read beforehand that most of the lyrics are just straight poetry and that comparisons were drawn to the likes of Charles Bukowski, which persuaded me to think that I was going to feel things somewhere deep down. But, on a first listen anyway, I didn’t really feel much at all. It just came off as pretty good, which certainly isn’t what Rolling Stone, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and Village Voice had in mind when they named it the best album of the year, I’m sure. I definitely want to relisten to it soon (I have a long bus ride coming up in a few days that will likely provide the perfect context) in hopes that maybe I just wasn’t paying enough attention. One little thing that did catch me off guard was how the album seemed to be such a mash-up of punk and early alternative. Some songs would be those prototypical minute and a half rushes, but others were slowed down and more…deliberate I guess. I initially chalked that up to band progression, but apparently X actually became more punk on their sophomore album. What other band pulls that off?

Favorite Tracks: It’s Who You Know; Adult Books; In This House That I Call Home

Emily: It took me a bit to come up with what I wanted to write about Wild Gift. I enjoyed it, but I didn't take away much from it upon one listen. The sound bridged the gap a bit between punk and more mainstream rock, adding more guitar and subtracting the standard thrashing around. I thought the best tracks on the album were the ones that really strayed from the short, 3-chord, scream-sung expectations of punk music - not that I don't like that sound; as previous reviews indicate, I'm quite a punk fan. The longer songs, however, seemed fuller and more developed, with strong musicianship and even stronger vocals that often dueled between male and female. It seems, though, that the real creativity lies in the poetic lyrics. I couldn't pick up on that through just one listen, so I'll definitely have to give it at least one more chance.

Favorite Tracks: Adult Books; It's Who You Know; In This House That I Call Home

A Quarter of the Way There

Now that we’re one whole quarter of the way through, we decided to take a second to examine how this voyage (nearly 3-years-worth!) has affected the top 5 lists we each made at the very start. The results were, well, see for yourself

Zack: I looked back at what I had picked as my Top 5 favorite bands/artists when this began and what I wrote, and well, lol. Hendrix still reigns supreme, but the rest of my Top 5 has been completely shaken up. I’m relistening to Harvest Moon as I write this, so Neil Young has earned his place. Kanye has dropped two incredible solo albums and helped make this happen, while Lupe has produced 2 subpar albums and 1 good mixtape in that time, leading to a major switch. Hilariously, I made it a point to say that “Country pretty much sucks,” which now seems to have come back and bitten me since I have to include Johnny Cash here. Oh, and I finally opened my horizons and listened to the Clash (minus their debut and Cut the Crap). What happened after that was practically destiny.

Top 5 Bands (as of 8/25/13)

1. The Jimi Hendrix Experience

2. Neil Young

3. Kanye West

4. Johnny Cash

5. The Clash

Emily: Revisiting this Top 5 bands/artists list was more difficult than I expected. It was pretty easy when I did it the first time when we started the blog since my musical tastes were fairly narrow. However, after exploring 250 albums that were mostly unknown and hearing new music all the time as it has been released (and from Zack, of course), I barely knew where to start with this list. Two bands came to mind quickly; one my favorite since middle school that I could never give up, and the other a newer favorite that was cemented by seeing them live and from 15 feet away. After that, I didn't know how to continue. Should I pick the best live bands? The ones whose albums I keep coming back to? What about the ones I've just started to explore? To try to sort this all out, I decided to sit down with my breakfast and a mug of green tea to sort through old blog posts and iTunes and hopefully come to a conclusion. The results were even more inconclusive. I thought of how much I love Jeff Buckley and the Dead Kennedys, but does listening to one album qualify as a favorite? What about my evolving fandom of Kanye West? I've listened to way more of his stuff than those other two, but I can count that as a favorite. And then there are the concerts - I've seen the Killers, Muse, fun., and a slew of other artists in the past few years. Does that count as a favorite? I think my ultimate conclusion is that I don't really have favorite artists anymore. I now listen to music on an album-by-album basis, and those albums - not a discography, not an artist - are what have become my favorites. Regardless, the task was 5 artists, and that is the list I will provide - though it doesn't really give my music favorites justice.

Top 5 Bands (as of 8/25/13)

1. Green Day

2. Foo Fighters

3. fun.

4. Kanye West

5. The Killers

#250: Bjork - Vespertine (2001)

Emily: My general impression of Bjork can be summed up by her infamous swan dress, which she actually wore around the same time Vespertine was released. She even had an egg-shaped purse! So avant garde! Or, more likely, batshit crazy. Luckily for us, there was a significant lack of swan involved in this album - as well as a significant lack of crazy reflected by said swans. What I expected would be filled with earsplitting experimentation was actually a beautiful collection of ambient music, punctuated by Bjork's ethereal singing. The album has a dreamlike quality that softens background noise into fantasy, fitting quite well with the Harry Potter book I've been re-reading. I imagine it would work well as an antidote to studying as well - perhaps I'll try it out in the coming semester. I guess Bjork really was going for avant garde with the swans after all.
Favorite Tracks: It's Not Up to You; Sun in My Mouth; Heirloom

Zack: Bjork is pretty much known for being Icelandic and a little crazy (I’m not sure if the two can be mutually exclusive, and I have no idea if that joke was funny), so I didn’t really know what to expect here. What she delivered was an album of lush soundscapes that envelop you. There’s almost a certain mystical quality to it. Like each song may have come from a really dynamic scene in Spirited Away. Her singing can be hard to understand some time, but it fits in with the music perfectly. Overall, Vespertine was a very unique album that seemed to whirl and whisk across the room while it was playing.

Favorite Tracks: Pagan Poetry; It’s Not Up to You; An Echo, a Stain

#249: Elvis Costello and the Attractions - This Year's Model (1978)

Zack: It’s been a while since we listened to My Aim Is True, but I’ve relistened to it a couple dozen times at this point. I think I mentioned back then how impressed I was with the genre versatility, and that’s definitely why I still appreciate it. Costello flies between styles from track to track, creating a diversity that most musicians (let alone musicians in their debut album) would be afraid to tackle. This Year’s Model, his second album, doesn’t vary as much, but it does have several really good songs. And, as we should all expect, the lyrics to those songs are extremely clever and even a bit cryptic. For example, Pump it Up – which used to be played all the time at the large retail establishment that I worked for – is about masturbating. Anyway, I liked My Aim Is True Better, but This Year’s Model was still a solid album.

Favorite Tracks: (I Don’t Want to Go to) Chelsea; Lipstick Vogue; Pump it Up

Emily: For many of the artists that have multiple albums on this list (especially those with 4 or more), we've tried to intermingle them with other albums in order to spread them out more or less evenly (and not to end up with, say, 4 Byrds albums in the last 100). The next step is to listen to each in chronological order. We could listen to them out of order just because, but this way we can really see how these artists evolve in terms of musicianship, lyrics, genre, and connection with the audience. Since these artists tend to be those included in the pantheon of popular music, it also allows us to see why and how they became so highly regarded in the first place. Elvis Costello happens to be one of those artists, and he's one that I initially knew next to nothing about. I really enjoyed My Aim is True and have relistened to it since we reviewed it way back when, and This Year's Model built on the successes of that debut. Costello knows how to create great pop music. The album is upbeat with hints of pop, punk, and new wave, and the lyrics are creative enough to keep you listening closely even while you're dancing along. Though this was a great album, I'm still trying to figure out why Elvis Costello has been placed on the level of the other artists with multiple albums on the list. The evidence is building, and I guess I'll find out more in a couple hundred albums or so.

Favorite Tracks: (I Don't Want to Go to) Chelsea; The Beat; Lipstick Vogue

#248: Antony and the Johnsons - I Am a Bird Now (2005)

Emily: From the photo that makes up I Am a Bird Now's album cover, one could assume that they were in for something dark, depressing, and/or weird. The hospital bed, the sad girl with dark lipstick, the name of the file on Wikipedia including the word "deathbed" - it all points to that. In this case, however, you just can't judge an album by its cover art. I Am a Bird Now, while not exactly upbeat, is neither dark nor depressing nor weird. It's a collection of simple songs full of emotion and personal connections. Antony Hegarty, the lead singer, clearly pours his heart into his work. This shows in the lyrics and music, but it comes through most strongly in the way he sings. The result is a beautiful album that will stay with you, just waiting to be listened to again and again.

Favorite Tracks: You Are My Sister; Fistful of Love; My Lady Story

Zack: The first person to tell me about Antony and the Johnsons was my freshman year suitemate. He hyped it to me in the spring of 2010 because he was excited about their fourth album coming out the following fall in light of their third album, which he had fallen in love with the previous year. Considering his other big recommendation for me was G. Love and the Special Sauce, whose debut album I still enjoy years after we first listened to it for blog-related purposes (BRP), I probably should have heeded it back then. I Am a Bird Now, while not one of the two albums he had such a passion or high expectations for, is just very sweet sounding. It sort of reminded me of Nick Drake, not in tone (definitely not in tone, at all), because of their mutual simplicity. While Antony Hegarty was able to form a complete band and bring in a who’s-who of guest musicians – Lou Reed, Rufus Wainwright, Devendra Banhart and (surprisingly) Boy George! – there’s no denying that the driving force of each song is Hegarty’s piano work and his singing. Even when he cedes some control of the song over to one of these legendary or, at the very least, exceptionally talented musicians, it’s still very clear that each and every song is his creation.

Favorite Tracks: Fistful of Love; My Lady Story; You Are My Sister

#247: Les Rythmes Digitales - Darkdancer (1999)

Zack: Full disclosure: I was in a really foul mood when I listened to this album and there’s a pretty decent chance I let it bleed into my experience. Regardless, I’ve been in bad moods before and listened to an album for the blog and found that it settled me down or picked up my spirits or something. This was not one of those cases. All I kept saying to myself was “Jeez! More of this shit?” Pretty much every track was a test of perseverance against extreme annoyance. Each song was seemingly endlessly repetitive, looping the same aggravating sounds over and over and over again. It seemed like Daft Punk’s Rollin’ and Scratchin’ -  by far the worst track on an otherwise pretty solid Homework – stretched over an entire 55 minutes. I wanted to throw my laptop to the other side of the room and go drink some herbal tea. I may do the latter now as a means of coping.

Favorite (?) Tracks: Damaged People; Hypnotise; Sometimes

Emily: Unlike Zack, I was in a pretty good mood while I listened to this album. It was my last day of work, and I was merrily slicing up flyers with a paper cutter for my boss. This ended up being quite a good environment for listening to Les Rythmes Digitales. Yes, each track was extremely repetitive and could probably have been half as long and created a similar effect. However, the production is very clean to hear - it doesn't have a lot of the earsplitting scratching and other sound effects that turn me away from electronic music as a genre. I found myself bobbing up and down as I did my work, as full-out dancing is generally discouraged when your boss can walk in at any moment, with visions of European discos playing in my head. For a genre that I generally dread listening to, Darkdancer was a remarkably pleasant surprise.
Favorite Tracks: Music Makes You Lose Control; (Hey You) What's That Sound?; Dreamin'

#246: Drive-By Truckers - Southern Rock Opera (2001)

Zack: I was mildly interested in listening to this up until the time I saw it was a double album. Country and Southern rock have been so hit-or-miss for us that I was terrified of investing more than 90 minutes into something I might come to loathe. I pushed it back a few days. Finally, I figured, I was going to have to listen to it eventually and I might as well try and enjoy it. I’m glad I made it a point to go in with an open mind, because this album is a really impressive feat of musical ingenuity. Southern Rock Opera is, as the name suggests, a southern rock (with some alternative country and even a dash of cowpunk here or there)-styled rock opera that aims to deconstruct the Deep South mythology. If it wasn’t for the three-guitar based assault that’s constantly whirring about, it would practically be academic. Drive-By Truckers have no interest in glorifying the South and its larger-than-life figures, a la Lynyrd Skynyrd, or even condemning its – ahem – checkered past like Neil Young famously does in Southern Man and (the fabulous track from Harvest) Alabama – a well-known dispute touched upon on SRO in the second track, Ronnie and Neil. Instead, they want to focus on the grey that lies between those two extremes. Or, as it’s put in a few songs, breaking down “the duality of the ‘Southern Thing.’” And when their attention is clearly devoted to that goal, SRO is magical. I think things tend to get a bit hazy when they jump into the secondary theme of exploring things from Skynyrd’s point of view, and the insistence on doing so adds quite a few unnecessary tracks, especially on the album’s shaky back end. But when Drive-By Truckers are trucking along in their investigation of southern dichotomy, they take both the southern rock and alternative country genres to a level of intelligence and sophistication I haven’t seen elsewhere.

Favorite Tracks: Birmingham; Wallace; The Southern Thing

Emily: True to its name, Southern Rock Opera tells quite an operatic story of the South. By personifying the different experiences and elements of the "Southern thing" through icons such as Lynyrd Skynyrd, George Wallace, and Neil Young as well as other unnamed Southerners and members of the Drive-By Truckers themselves, Southern Rock Opera creates a nuanced image of the South in the 1970s and beyond. The first half of the album is especially successful. Southern rock and country provide a backdrop to the story, which could effectively work as a staged musical. Well, maybe not one with a cohesive story, but perhaps a series of vignettes that all tie together as elements of the band's Southern thing. This idea really came to mind while hearing The Three Great Alabama Icons. The rock of this song is more subdued to make way for a spoken-word story of the narrator, a young Southerner, and his interpretation of the great looming figures of his home state - Ronnie van Zant (of Lynyrd Skynyrd), Bear Bryant (Alabama's head football coach in a football-loving state), and George Wallace (the infamous Alabama governor who became the face against the civil rights movement in the '60s). The storytelling was so vivid that I could envision the scenes being acted out as the narrator spoke, and it continued into the next song, Wallace, which describes George Wallace's entrance into hell - from the perspective of the devil. Unfortunately, the second half of this double album wasn't nearly as unique or successful. But the first half? It presents the South in music from an original, honest, and realistic perspective, a perspective that seems to be lacking in most other country and Southern rock music.

Favorite Tracks: The Three Great Alabama Icons; The Southern Thing; Birmingham

#245: The Byrds - Mr. Tambourine Man (1965)

Zack: Behold, the band that makes everyone say, “Wait, they have how many albums on this list?” The fact that The Byrds have five albums deemed to be among the 1001 best is such a head-turner that we forgot all about them until I realized that we should be listening to one every 200 albums or so and we were about 240 albums in. So here is our first foray into a band deemed to be as sonically significant as Led Zeppelin, The Who and Radiohead, and I thought it was about as campy as Hitchcock’s movie sounds on paper. It was that semi-folk rock sound that tends to dominate classic rock radio stations more than it should and that we’re bumped into a few times before here. I typically find this sound to be unimpressive, and this wasn’t really a change. Mr. Tambourine Man had its moments, but it was, for the most part, just sort of boring. Hopefully The Byrds change it up somewhere down the line, because four more version of this would be hard to stomach.

Favorite Tracks: I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better; It’s No Use; Mr. Tambourine Man

Emily: Zack told me that I had to pick a Byrds album in this batch. In fact, he even listed them under 2 categories to make sure I didn't forget. Even though they have 5 albums on the list, I guess I've just skipped over them every time we've decided to listen to folk. Having listened to their debut, I'll probably end up skipping over them again later on. The band had seen A Hard Day's Night and decided they wanted to sound like the Beatles, so they bought similar instruments and worked with that mid-'60s pop-rock sound, adding some folk in as well. They came up with a pleasant enough collection of songs made for radio play, but Mr. Tambourine Man is nothing remarkable. If you want a mid-'60s Beatles sound, just listen to the real thing instead.

Favorite Tracks: Don't Doubt Yourself, Babe; I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better; Here Without You

#244: Manic Street Preachers - The Holy Bible (1994)

Zack: It’s been my impression that musicians typically write the music before coming up with lyrics. Or, at best, they were devised in tandem. Apparently, Manic Street Preachers decided to switch up the formula, because Wikipedia leads me to believe that lyrics were priority No. 1, with writing suitable music for the subject material but a secondary concern. The result is frequently very smart, analytical lyrics with music devised to accentuate. Finding a suitable comparison for Manic Street Preachers is difficult, but it really reminded me of Pink Floyd. Okay, I’m sure I just lost everyone who has ever listened to even a single song from each, so let me explain myself. Everyone knows how Syd Barrett was the leader of Pink Floyd up until the time that his mental illness became too debilitating and he had to leave. Well, the lyrics from Holy Bible are clearly the product of a similarly unwell individual, and the exploration is fascinating. Take, for example, the song 4st 7lb, which is a reference to the minimum weight doctors say an anorexic person can be before they’re dead (4 stones, 7 pounds). Well, the leader of Manic Street Preachers suffered from anorexia – along with masochistic tendencies and alcoholism – and weighed only 6 stones. I don’t have internet right now, so I’m not sure what that is in human terms, but I’m guessing not good. Holy Bible has plenty of such dark inversion. But the entire album isn’t internal meditations. In plenty of places, the band favored highly political content. The most obvious example of this is probably IfWhiteAmericaToldTheTruthForOneDayIt'sWorldWouldFallApart. Besides for tricking every reader into thinking that my space bar had broken, it’s also a strong condemnation of American exceptionalism specifically and American politics generally. Other targets include British imperialism and the death penalty. The balance of this intense introversion and extroversion is really pretty special, and makes this album a very well hidden gem.

Favorite Tracks: IfWhiteAmericaToldTheTruthForOneDayIt'sWorldWouldFallApart; 4st 7lb, Yes

Emily: On the surface, the inclusion of this album seems like just more proof that this list is incredible Brit-centric. I had kind of heard of the Manic Street Preachers before from my Anglophile best friend, but other than that they don't seem to have achieved significant success outside the UK. It's just another random band that no one here cares about, I thought, but maybe it'll be more interesting than some of the others. Well, even though they may not hold as much renown as many of the artists on this list, the Manic Street Preachers certainly deserve to be invited to the party. With a post-punk inspired sound during the era of grunge, The Holy Bible hearkens back to the beginnings of alternative music, while the duality of political and personal lyrics makes it unique. Of course, with such a lyric-driven album and my propensity to not focus on lyrics during an initial listen, I'm sure there is much I missed, especially in Richey Edwards' emotional turmoil of addiction and depression. It's certainly worth multiple listens, which I will hopefully partake in soon enough.

Favorite Tracks: She is Suffering; IfWhiteAmericaToldTheTruthForOneDayIt'sWorldWouldFallApart; Faster

#243: Neil Young - Harvest (1972)

Emily: So Zack listened to this album almost 2 wweeks ago as he was packing up his old apartment. And he told me that he loved it. Loved it so much that he listened to it again and again and again until finally writing an essay of an album review. Clearly, this increased my anticipation for this album. My goal was, however, to listen to it without any information about why he gave it such a ringing endorsement. To do so, I didn't read his review nor did I really discussed the album with him (and I won't read his review until I finish writing this). And you know what? I really enjoyed it too. Harvest is a bit more country than my usual musical taste, but the rock influences and storytelling within the songs drew me in until the end. I definitely need to relisten to it in order to more fully flesh out my opinion, but for now I want to see what Zack had to say without further ado.
Favorite Tracks: There's a World; Old Man; Heart of Gold

Zack: It was but a week ago that I was complaining to Emily that no album had really separated itself from the pack as a leader for our slowly approaching 300 album award post. Obviously, there was and is still time, but seeing as we were rapidly approaching halfway through, the fact that nothing had really stuck out was alarming. Then I listened to Steely Dan and Bob Dylan and felt somewhat relieved. “Maybe a jaw-dropping album is too much to ask for,” I thought to myself. “Maybe I’ll just have to settle.” And then, ladies and gentlemen, Harvest. I took a few seconds away from packing up all of my worldly belongings to hit play, and immediately hit play again once it was over. From top to bottom, Harvest was fantastic. As much as I love Rust Never Sleeps, I had to admit that this was the superior product. You see, I’ve been delving into the Neil Young repertoire ever since I was floored by Rust Never Sleeps, or as best as I could. When an artist really wows me, I tend to do so. It got a bit complicated here, though, since Mr. Young has so many albums on the list (in a four-way tie for most with seven), and I didn’t want to listen to any of them before it was time. So I cheated a little but – I made a Neil Young Pandora station and listened to one or two live albums. I’ve heard some of these songs from those avenues. But something about hearing them all together is just so perfect. I think because the album really serves as a harvesting (see what I did there?) of all Neil Young’s influences. There are folksy songs, country songs, southern rock-esque songs (that lament the racist nature of the south at the time), and traditional 70s rock songs. Some songs are philosophic meditations and others are deeply personal laments. Some are bare bones, acoustic guitar and vocals while others are much more grandiose, even seeming like they belong on the Inception soundtrack. And all of it comes together to form something beautiful. Being pressed to pick favorite songs is hard because each song was tremendous in its own special way. Even the songs that I didn’t like as much I could easily see someone else really connecting with. Seriously, I’m going to pick three songs, but just know that Alabama or Old Man or Are You Ready for the Country or really any of the other songs could be in any of these places depending on the day and my mood.

Favorite Tracks: The Needle and the Damage Done; Heart of Gold; There’s a World

#242: T. Rex - Electric Warrior (1971)

Emily: Zack originally classified this album under psychedelic rock. Wikipedia says its glam rock. Both of those label, however, are somewhat misleading. There were psychedelic influences throughout Electric Warrior, as well as some grooving glam tracks, but the album transcends those genre lines and draws on a bunch of different sounds from the era. The result is fun, upbeat, and rockin'. Get it On, T. Rex's big international hit and the best-known song from this album, sounds almost like disco a few years early (with the awesome addition of glammy guitars). Is Electric Warrior the greatest of any of the genres it explores? Of course not, but it's still a great time to be had.
Favorite Tracks: Get it On; Mambo Sun; Rip Off

Zack: This album was a major disappointment, in that there wasn’t a single roar from a prehistoric apex predator. Really, that’s all I’ve ever wanted from an album. Once I got over that crushing blow, I came to be quite fond of Electric Warrior. It did a great job at embodying some of the musical trends that developed in the late 60s and early 70s while also avoiding the common pitfall of sounding dated. It wasn’t the greatest album of that year (I actually looked it up, and Who’s Next, What’s Going On, Sticky Fingers, From Fillmore East, Pearl, Blue and L.A. Woman were all released that year. And those are just the ones we’ve listened to already.) But it still was pretty solid overall and worth checking out.

Favorite Tracks: Get it On; Life’s a Gas; Mambo Sun

#241: Ice Cube - The Predator (1992)

Zack: More than any other West Coast G-funk album, I’ve been dying to listen to The Predator. More than Straight Outta Compton or The Chronic (which I’ve already listened to, but not in several years) or even Ice Cube’s more well-known album, AmeriKKKa’s Most Wanted. Besides for the inclusion of It Was a Good Day, a song so fantastic that it has the inherent ability to make any day a good day, I knew his album served as somewhat of a chronicling of the emotional aftermath of the L.A. Riots. In that respect, The Predator is especially dynamic. The recording encompassed a long enough stretch that some songs clearly were recorded before the Rodney King cops’ verdict, and some after. Because of this distinction, some songs seem to really capture the visceral fury that people felt while others feel more like explanations for the aftermath. Most notably among the latter is We Had to Tear This Motherfucka Up, which details exactly why they had to tear that motherfucka up. Imbedded throughout the album are “inserts,” which effectively serve as skits like you see on so many other hip-hop albums. But these are way more interesting because of their content. One of the inserts is a clip from an interview where Ice Cube explains how his earlier albums were almost prophetic of the riots. Oh, and on top of all this, some songs sample the movie Predator 2, which you may remember as the one where a Predator hunts cartel members and police officers in Los Angeles. When all of this is mixed together, the product is an intensely smart, if often abrasive, political manifesto about race relations in a major urban center during a time of extreme crisis. And it’s even more impressive than I thought it would be.

Favorite Tracks: It Was a Good Day; Say Hi to the Bad Guy; We Had to Tear This Motherfucka Up

Emily: I'm a bit disappointed that I didn't get to actually listen to this album with Zack. He tends to be way more informed about rap, and knows what to listen for depending on the artist and album. Alas, I did this one on my own - but I think I did okay. The political themes caught my attention more. The sketches throughout the album illustrate different perspectives on race relations in the early '90s, including the police, the white perspective portrayed in the media, and most importantly the view of young African-Americans. Since Ice Cube recorded this album in LA during the Rodney King saga, the anger and sense of futility about these issues from the era is evident throughout. The effect is often abrasive, but the issues couldn't be addressed honestly in any other way. Ice Cube's album reflects the time and place it was made in, making it necessary listening to truly understand what was going on.

Favorite Tracks: It was a Good Day; Who Got the Camera?; When Will They Shoot?

#240: Todd Rundgren - A Wizard, a True Star (1973)

Zack: I read Wikipedia the day before listening to the album because I was bored and it’s like a billion degrees and I didn’t want to do anything else that might mean moving away from the fan. So I came into this album thinking it would be some sort of experimental version of The Beatles, sort of like Frank Zappa. And, in some places, it was. But in others, it sounded more like mid-to-late career Pink Floyd, which is impressive since it actually pre-dates mid-to-late era Pink Floyd. The most notable thing about this album is how short most of the songs are. That’s a problem I’ve run into with quite a few punk albums, because you look up and all of a sudden you’re 5 songs further in than you thought you were and you have to go back and figure out what songs you liked and didn’t. It wasn’t even that all the songs sounded the same – that’s actually very far from the truth. It was that all these different noises blended together very well, but in a way that was cohesive enough that actual changes in song were easily confused for just twists and turns in the melody of one song in particular. I want to go back and listen to this again under a set of circumstances that doesn’t involve having to formulate an opinion that I can write about because I think I’ll enjoy it more like that. For now, all I can really say is that it seemed to me to be something you have to listen all the way through. Picking just a few tracks here or there won’t give you the right idea of what it’s all about.

Favorite Tracks: Zen Archer; Rock and Roll Pussy; Just One Victory

Emily: As I listened to this album through my commutes to and from work today, I made sure to listen closely. Zack told me that the tracks tend to blend together since many are super short, and sometimes I tend to zone out while I'm multitasking during an album listen. The commute environment, while not always ideal by its tendency towards ambient noise that is way louder and more unpleasant than ambiance should be, worked really nicely today to eliminate any distractions so that I stayed intently focused on A Wizard, a True Star. It's kind of hard to evaluate the album on a song-by-song basis. Most of them on their own aren't spectacular; some are pretty lame in fact. However, when put together, it all makes sense. They flow into each other one by one, though not as one sound. Each is distinct, pulling from genres as diverse as psychedelic, progressive, early '60s pop, and soul. They fit together like a kaleidoscope, different and distorted and sometimes weird, but all making up the same picture. Only a nonstop listen will do this album justice, and I highly recommend that you do so.

Favorite Tracks: Zen Archer; When the Shit Hits the Fan/Sunset Blvd; I Don't Want to Tie You Down