Thread 128199395

ITT: /mu/ in 1974

THIS AIN'T ROCK AND ROLL, THIS IS GENOCIDE

Goodnight sweet prince.

>>128199395 (OP)
Man, did Led Zeppelin replace their singer with a chick?

New band apparently. Absolute bullshit, this is what rock is coming to these days?

You can probably see my hand right there in the cover, bet you kids are probably jealous
>>128199491
I hate punk rock.

>>128199395 (OP)
Oh man, this is my bag!

This economy is for the birds, man.

>>128199447
What a bad way to go out after 50 years of recording. Absolute humiliation ritual.

bros this hits hard

Therefore I shall resign the presidency effective at noon tomorrow.

I wanted to call this the most literate album since Quadrophenia, but it's only the wordiest--the gatefold featuring two pages of half-sized, double-spaced libretto. The album's apparent subject is the symbolic quest of a Puerto Rican street/hood rat/graffiti artist named Rael, but the lyrics neither shine by themselves nor provide any unusual thematic insight I'm eager to pursue. For art rock, it's listenable, though, featuring Eno touches and a hook that goes (I'm humming) "On Bro-ad-wayyy." B-

These prognatheous New Englanders demonstrate the old adage that if a band is going to be dumb it may as well be American dumb and here they provide a real treat for the hearing-impaired on side one. Pretty good sense of humor, too, assuming "Lord of the Thighs" is intended as a joke. With dumb bands it's always hard to tell. B-

>>128199395 (OP)
/BSG/ Black Sabbath General - Spiro Agnewtech Edition -
Post your crunchiest riffs.

kind of an off year not many good albums

>>128199491
I don't understand it, senpai. How does this rock so hard yet suck at the same time? They're painted like mimes but they keep talking.

>>128199996
They didn't even have an album out this year.

>>128200010
First off, don't meta post in a time machine thread.

They had a US tour for SBS in '74 which released late 1974.

>>128199616
he was old and didn't care about anything anymore except a quick low effort paycheck

>>128199967
i like seasons of wither

Lou sure is adept at figuring out new ways to shit on people. I mean, what else are we to make of this grotesque hodgepodge of soul horns, flash guitar, deadpan songspeech, and indifferent rhymes? I don't know, and Lou probably doesn't either--even as he shits on us he can't staunch his own cleverness. So the hodgepodge produces juxtapositions that are funny and interesting, the title tune is as deadly accurate as it is mean-spirited, and "Billy" is simply moving, indifferent rhymes and all. B+

>>128200024
Their nadir pretty much.

Is this a band or a street gang?

In which a man who has always turned his genuine if unendearing talent for image manipulation to the service of his dubious literary and theatrical gifts evolves from harmless kitsch into pernicious sensationalism. Despite two good songs and some thoughtful (if unhummable) rock sonorities, this is doomsday purveyed from a pleasure dome. Message: eat, snort, and be pervy, for tomorrow we shall be peoploids--but tonight how about buying this piece of plastic? Say nay. C+

>>128200118
why did critics hate Bowie so much back then?

>>128199932
I made it about 20% of the way through this thing before giving up.

This is measurably stronger than Goat's Head Soup and when I listen closely I hear enough audacious jokes, interesting guitar licks, and arresting bass runs for two albums. I also hear lazy rhymes, indolent phrasing, two sides that start on a plateau and wind down from there, and a song about dancing with Father Time that appears to mean more than it intends, or do I mean more than I mean? B

>>128200169
nobody's actually listened to the entire LLDOB

Sometime over the past year, while I wasn't playing their records, I began to wonder whether a cross between the Velvet Underground and Uriah Heep was my idea of a good time. The driving, effortless wit and density of Buck Dharma's guitar flourish in this cold climate, but Eric Bloom couldn't project emotion if they let him, and I'm square enough to find his pseudo-pseudospade cynicism less than funny. Subject of "Dominance and Submission": New Year's 1964 in Times Square. B

Now this really is an American band, healthy, confident, schlocky, with all manner of contradictions buried beneath the surface. Myself I prefer the title cut, which bursts forth with a, you shall pardon the expression, raw power they've never managed before, to "The Loco-Motion" where Mark Farner sounds shaky. But how many groups get to record a ninth album, let alone make it their best? A-

>>128200328
Oh _now_ they're awesome since they turned into commercial buttrock.

Aw, what do you need new bands for anyway? Everyone knows rock attained perfection in 1974, it's a scientific fact.

Wow I really hope that in the next 51 years I put my life in order

They say this is the rock and roll of the future, which I find a depressing thought even though (or because) the amalgam is a moderately smart one. Straight-ahead art-rock, sort of--Queen without preening. Yes without pianistics and meter shifts. And "Bloody Well Right" documents a gift for the killer hook. Now if only "Bloody Well Right" weren't an impassioned plea for complacency. Maybe if we close our eyes they'll go away. C+

>>128200433
somehow after he came back from retirement in 73 his voice was never quite right again, that two year downtime made him lose something permanently

>>128200109
I saw them last week at CBGB. They were playing in front of like ten people and FIGHTING on stage. They couldn’t even agree on which song to play next. I doubt they’ll ever release an album.

>>128199626
this group sucks dick, man

>>128200406
>inb4 that one schizo who hates Supertramp

R.I.P.

Disillusioned acolytes are complaining that he's retreated, which means he's finally made top ten, but that's just his reward for professional persistence. If anything, the satire's improved a little, and the title piece--an improvisation with Jack Bruce, Jim Gordon, and rhythm guitarist Tony Duran--forays into quartet-style jazz-rock. Given Frank's distaste for "Cosmik Debris" you'd think maybe he's come up with something earthier than Mahavishnu, but given his distaste for sex you can be sure it's more cerebral instead. B-

>>128200003
I rather noticed 74 didn't have an obvious sound or zeitgeist. There's not any particular sound that marks something as specifically tied to this year.

Despite my immense misgivings--Newman's political sensitivity, a useful attribute in one conceptualizing about the South, has never impressed me--I'm convinced that this is Newman's second-best album. It also rights a career that was threatening to wind down into cheap sarcasm. Contrary to published report, the white Southerners Newman sings about/from are never objects of contempt. Even Newman's psychotic and exhibitionist and moron show dignity and imagination, and the rednecks of the album's most notorious songs are imbued by the smart-ass Los Angeles Jew who created them with ironic distance, a smart-ass's kindest cut of all. There is, natcherly, a darker irony: no matter how smart they are about how dumb they are, they still can't think of anything better to do than keep the niggers down. A

Welp.

>>128200650
you automatically know nothing good is going to come out of an album with that cover

Aretha has established herself as such a solid property--certain to hold onto a good-sized audience for years to come, but unlikely to expand any further--that it's getting hard to resist thinking of her as a cross between Frank Sinatra and Nancy Wilson, turning out collections as custom-designed as next year's Oldsmobile. This one's more ethereal styling--less bottom, more la-la scatting--is presaged by Young, Gifted and Black's exploration of the spirituality on black pop rather than Hey Now Hey's spindrift, and I like it fine. But it's hard to get excited about an album that puts so much of its soul into the codas. B+

>>128200722
actually yeah, how much Aretha does anyone need? a couple late 60s-early 70s albums are the only essential ones.

>>128200567
>I'm from LA and man, people from the South are sure dum XD

Talkin' loud and sayin' nothing, Brown's streetwise factotum intones: "He's still the baddest--always will be the baddest--that's why we give him credit for being the superstar he is." A bad sign (really bad, I mean). As are "Who Can I Turn To" and "Don't Fence Me In." B-

Joel's Cold Spring Harbor was recorded in the vicinity of 38-rpm to fit all the material on--he's one of these eternal teenagers who doesn't know how to shut up. Stubborn little bastard, too--after his bid stiffed, he worked a Los Angeles cocktail lounge soaking up Experience. Here he poses as the Irving Berlin of narcissistic alienation, puffing up and condescending to the fantasies of fans who spend their lives by the stereo feeling sensitive. And just to remind them who's boss, he hits them with a ballad after the manner of Aaron Copland. C

>>128200826
the coke was getting to him by this point

These lyrics aren't banal, just plain-spoken (my favorite: "Keepin' It to Myself"), and in any case the passionate expertness of the vocal mix (like the Rascals, only the Rascals were never this tight), combined with a motion more Brownian than most black groups can manage, more than makes up. A-

I would describe the performances here as spirited rather than inspired, but they're definitely not compromised, which makes this collaboration of genius an automatic collector's item. I suspect I won't play it as much as I do the Joe Turner/Otis Spann/T-Bone Walker session that Bob Thiele set up five years ago. But then, I never figured I'd play that one as much as I do. A-

>>128199626
>Frehley wrote and played the machine gun-like guitar riff as well as the bass on "Parasite" however had Simmons do the vocals as he was not confident enough in his own singing ability.[3] The band had their gear stolen shortly after arriving in Los Angeles for the recording of Hotter Than Hell.[5]

>>128201146
>Bob Thiele
Oh no...

>>128199395 (OP)
i heard this guy rolls around in glass shards on stage, what a fucking maniac, nothing will ever come of his dumbfuck retard rock style

>>128199626
>>128199491
their playing was definitely more inspired in the early days than the so-so instrumentals on Love Gun

Billy Joel sucks, that is all.

If Dave Crawford really wants to turn B.B. into a major "contemporary" soul singer, he shouldn't make him sing Dave Crawford's songs. Best cut: the instrumental. C

This may be catchy but I refuse to get caught; they may be good at what they do, but what they do is so disgusting that that only makes it worse. I would tell them to find their roots, but instead of regrouping as the Champs, they'd probably convince Warner Bros. to waste more vinyl on the Anita Kerr Singers. D-

The single almost made number one on the billboard until its radar ran out of love down the stretch and it got knocked off by Grand Funk's "The Loco-Motion." Yah, yah, our stupid-rock is better than your stupid-rock. Especially when yours comes from Holland. C

>>128201304
this is painful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LSSD-79Il4

In a time when all the most prestigious music, even what passes for funk, is coated with silicone grease, Dylan is telling us to take that grease and jam it. Sure he's domestic, but his version of conjugal love is anything but smug, and this comes through in both the lyrics and the sound of the record itself. Blissful, sometimes, but sometimes it sounds like stray cat music--scrawny, cocky, and yowling up the stairs. A

Great stuff on the two good sides--tricky horn charts, "Please, Please, Please" with a Spanish accent, law-enforcement advice. Then there's the side of ballads w/strings, which might be all right if they were also w/voice, and the side that begins "I Can't Stand It '76." B

Alternate title: Shoogidy-boogity. B

>>128201511
mid-70s JB was at a nadir. totally self-indulgent garbage.

"Jolene" proves that sometimes she's a great singer-songwriter. "I Will Always Love You" proves that sometimes she's a good one. Porter Wagoner's "Lonely Comin' Down" proves that sometimes she should just sing. Her own "Highlight of My Life" proves that sometimes she should just shut up. And the rest proves nothing. B-

How about Fatso? D-

In which a self-admitted mean old man approximates a cross between the young Paul Anka and the post-Bennington Reparata and the Delrons, only his voice is higher and his lyrics more considered. The whole first side, ending with the cheerfully perverse "Little Brother," is perfect pop moderne, and that's not where you'll find my own pick hit, the cheerfully normal "Love Will Keep Us Together." B+

>>128201547
that's kinda racist tbqh, Bob

The title tune is great Ringo, as is "No No Song," and he does well enough with the rest of this well-chosen material, the exceptions being the three tunes he had a hand in writing himself. But the supersession form is deadening. Beaucoups of Blues took some initiative. B-

Since a strong singer (Paul Rodgers, who's letting the hair on his chest grow out) usually dominates a strong guitarist (Mike Ralphs, who's devoting himself to Paul Kossoff impressions anyway), this is less Mott the Hoople without pretensions (which are missed) than Free poppified (but not enough, hit single or no hit single). B-

More shoogidy-boogity. B

There's no way "Rock the Boat" could prepare you for the studied lameness of this LP unless you believe, as I do, that ersatz gospel liveliness doesn't validate the hit of 1974 any more than ersatz gospel beautifulness validated the hit of 1969. (That's a quiz.) Exception: "The Family," which studies hard. (Answer to quiz: "Oh Happy Day.") C

Something in his obsessive self-examination is easy to dislike and something in his whiny thinness hard to enjoy. But even "Ambulance Blues," an eight-minute throwaway, is studded with great lines, one of which is "It's hard to know the meaning of this song." And I can hum it for you if you'd like. A-

The title's as phony as the rest of the album, which despite the bought-and-paid-for goodies, an intro here, a harmony there, even a song somewhere or another, is mostly a tame collection of reshuffled platitudes. Especially enervating is "Oh, Camile," in which Graham lets us know he is morally superior to a doubt-ridden Vietnam vet. C-

>>128201833
yeah it's a filler album to fill out a record contract. what about?

>have you heard X?
>nah, can't afford it
>but it was played on the radio last night!
>must have missed it. did you record it?
>I can't afford to do that!
>well then I can't hear it
listening to music sucked in the 70s

The first side is good straight hard funk, kicked off by a title instrumental that's the best thing on the record--sure sign of a good straight hard funk band. The second side is acceptable straight hard funk, with some social consciousness thrown in by corporate stablemates Pam Sawyer and Gloria Jones (they even complain that girls are banned from football and boys from sensitivity). But I'll tell you something about hard funk--I prefer mine a little crooked. B+

>>128201888
in addition to that you could pay $7 for an album that was 1.5 good songs and 8 filler tracks

I worry that my former second-favorite clean-cut female singer will do a Helen Reddy and begin reminding me of Doris Day, but if anything this is a move toward La Vern Baker--"Just One Look" and "You Won't See Me" rock with expected grit. She should have left Kenny Loggins when the leaving was good, and I wish more of her MOR packed as much domestic drama and fresh-air sincerity as "Another Pot 'o Tea" or "Real Emotion," but this is her best to date. B

By opening the first side with "Motherless Children" and closing it with "I Shot the Sheriff," Clapton puts the rural repose of his laid-back-with-Leon music into a context of deprivation and conflict, adding bite to soft-spoken professions of need and faith that might otherwise smell faintly of the most rural of laid-back commodities, bullshit. And his honesty has its reward: better sex. The casual assurance you can hear now in his singing goes with the hip-twitching syncopation he brings to Robert Johnson's "Steady Rolling Man" and Elmore James's "I Can't Hold Out," and though the covers are what make this record memorable it's on "Get Ready," written and sung with Yvonne Elliman, that his voice takes on a mellow, seductive intimacy he's never come close to before. A

"You're So Vain" left a nice afterglow--as Ellen Willis says, it proves that rock and roll is so democratic that even a rich person can make a great single. But except for the startling "Mockingbird" (buy the forty-five if you must) the album's most interesting moment occurs when Simon whistles. Need I add that her whistling is flat musically and epistemologically? C

Theoretically, I am encouraged by Barbra's abandonment of Richard Perry and Contemporary Material, and in practice I love the title song, one of those beyootiful ballads that are the gift of AM programming to the reprobate rock and roller. But my big theory has always been that we like contemporary material because it is, well, contemporary, and in practice most of these performances generate a pristine, somewhat chill unreality even as they simulate warmth, maturity, all that stuff. Also, I'm not humming any of them after half a dozen plays. B-

Sure, "(You're Having) My Baby" is kind of cute. But the rest of the album is the usual abortion. C-

>>128202180
where would Goodwills be without this silly record?

Best cut: Allen Toussaint's "What Is Success," about the "so necessary" spiritual expenditures entered above a record company's bottom line. Whereupon Raitt pays her tribute to schlock four times over. Typically, she can uncover a stirring moment in the most stillborn possible-single, but the limits of her integrity have already been defined by three flexible, often playful, yet obviously uncompromising albums, and when the strings and woodwinds rise up, they dispossess her. Even "What Is Success" suffers a setback when Raitt accedes to Toussaint's impersonal "he." That's no "he," Bonnie--that's you. B

If I were gay, I imagine I'd love this record, because it would be about me, which I imagine would be some kind of relief. Since I'm straight, I have to complain about the forced, husky sensitivity of the man's timbre even as I hum his melodies and commend his all-around intelligence. B

I'm still intrigued by this after two months, which must be the music. The tricks repeat themselves, but they're good--the sharp, punky growl that accedes so naturally to the vulnerable falsetto, the punch of the drums against the depth of the strings. But the words fail me. Sayer makes much of his mask, but the mask is so enigmatic that it registers, at best, as a blank. Why then should I wonder what's behind it? B

I give up. Of course he's a machine, but haven't you ever loved a machine so much it took on its own personality? I was reminded of my first car, a '50 Plymouth. Then I decided Elton was more like a brand-new Impala I once rented on a magazine's money. Then I remembered that I ended up paying for that car myself. Yes, I hate the way he says "don't diszgard me" too, but "The Bitch Is Back" is my most favorite song. B+

This woman sings "I Wanna Be Your Man" and "All Shook Up" without gender changes, although she does rewrite a line of the latter so that she's "queer as a bug." But nothing in her own songwriting equals the one-riff rock of the two Chapman-Chinn singles, especially "48 Crash," and the last time I got off on someone dressed entirely in leather was before John Kay started repeating himself. B

The hot poop is that after nine albums, they finally have a frontman who can sing and write songs. The cold turkey is that the music remains the same as it ever was, as campy and ominous and Yurrupean as a vampire movie. C+

Todd Rundgren should be ashamed--Shadow Morton has gotten more out of the Dolls than they can give us live on any but their best nights. The definition is almost slick, but there's no loss in rawness. David cut the vocals three times and they sound as if he came in off the street and started shouting. The best of Jerry Nolan. And more, much more. A+

Seger is one of those hard rock legends I've never quite believed in, and I got enough out of side one of this ("Get Out of Denver," "Long Song Coming") to figure out why. Vocally, he's stuck at the adolescent outrage stage, between a screech and a scream, and this is unbecoming in such a grizzled veteran. B

>>128200255
I do like the cover. Me 262s were always a favourite of mine as a kid.

>>128199491
I only listen to these guys because it pisses off my parents

This is a great follow up. Not quite on the level of their previous, but I've been playing it on repeat. Im sure theyre going to continue to have a great career
>>128199967
I wasn't convinced of this band at first, but this new record is unmatched
Theyre putting Boston on the map

>>128202541
and then as if on cue Seger flipped from 16 at 29 to 55 at 30 overnight. good fucking job. also this album...eh...too Chuck Berry. way behind the times for '74.

>>128202541
This was his original review from '74, CGTT '70s had a revised and more flattering one.

>>128200994
at this point they're pretty much a regional Midwestern act

Except for the title tune, the only really interesting songs here are two by Porter Wagoner--Dolly's already done a whole album of "Take Me Back," and "Bubbling Over" is a lot more effervescent than "Gettin' Happy." Still, she repeats herself (and apes others) nicely enough. And blues strings followed by gospel medley rescues side two at the close. B

Great formula here. When it rocks, three guitarists and a keyboard player pile elementary riffs and feedback noises into dense combinations broken by preplanned solos, while at quieter moments the spare vocabulary of the best Southern folk music is evoked or just plain duplicated. And any suspicions that this substantial, tasteful band blew their best stuff on the first platter should fall in the wake of the first state song ever to make top ten, which will expose you to their infectious putdowns of rock businessmen, rock journalists, and heroin. A-

>>128201767
that was the usual story back then

>buy expensive album with the hit single+filler

>>128202250
catalog filler/contractual obligation

Switched-on Herbie jazzes it up one more time for all the Con Edison fans. C+

Side two is a partial recoup--however uncool devoting songs to loved ones may appear to the Autonomous Assholes of America, it makes sense when in fact your family (mother, father, namesake aunt) is dying all around you, and what's more it sounds like it makes sense. But that's no excuse for promulgating the peculiar idea that "Songs" make better friends than people, which misses the point of why people sing in the first place. B-

>>128201269
every band is like that when they get big and lose their ability to write about anything except being a rock star and the road and stuff

The Who, slightly plodding, is turned over to reveal. . .Black Sabbath, that's who, without the horseshit necromancy. And I'm loving every stolen riff if not every original one. B+

>>128200228
I have listened to the entirety of it every day since it was released. It was a little difficult to follow at first, but tony's chords are so comforting. I'm excited to see what peter and the band are going to cook up next year!

COME AND GET YOUR LOVE!

>>128207499
how do they sound anything like Sabbath riffs?

The Burton Cummings side of this group always wanted it to be Jimi Hendrix, Carlos Santana, and Gary Puckett and the Union Gap all rolled into one. This rather monstrous goal has finally been realized. Me, I preferred the part that wanted to be Bachman-Turner Overdrive. C

The difference between an album you love and an album you hate is often one or two cuts. An inspired song that fulfills a fantasy you never knew you had can make you believe in a whole side, while a song that commits some deadly sin can drag innocents to perdition. In "Music," for example, Cat tells us there wouldn't be any "wars in the world/If everybody joined in the band." This kind of lie is called a tautology; it's like saying there wouldn't be any hunger if everyone became an ice cream man. And makes you wonder why a guy who loves trees so much (reference: "King of Trees") designed a double-fold cover with cardboard inner sleeve for this unlovable single LP. C-

>>128208301
>track 2
that's kinda problematic dontcha think?

>>128208301
I've never know a Cat Stevens fan IRL I don't think they actually exist.

>>128208301
>another 70s lp that leads off with a thumping rocker and then is a bunch of soft rock filler bullshit
Saw that coming.

>>128200908
Billy Joel fuckin' blows, man.

>>128202366
Elton was suitably wacky enough at a time when most music was very droll singer-songwriter rock.

>>128199616
>that version of It Don't Mean a Thing
Oh dear.

>>128200003
Shit economy after the OPEC embargo and end of the protest era meant there wasn't a lot to sing about and record labels were playing it safe.

Old soldiers never die, they just rediscover the hick in their blood.

I've never trusted Cohen's arty reputation--a lot of page poets read better--but I continue to be a sucker for his voice, which has become more expressive and confident over the years without losing its flat, amateurish vulnerability. Some of the songs on this LP are less than memorable, but the settings, by arranger and co-producer John Lissauer, have the bizarro feel of John Simon's work on Cohen's first album, which I never believed was overproduced. For addicts, a genuine if occasional pleasure. A-

>>128207133
Herbie album #56 I think.

>>128208783
can't believe it took her all that time to cover YCH

>>128208447
that was partially why Zeppelin were as big as they were. one of the only groups to make consistently good albums.

Although the musical concept-theme that pops up here and there is unnecessarily explicit, the songs more than justify it. On the woman's side of the breakup, try "Washing the Dishes" (soap gets in your eyes) or "Sister's Coming Home"/"Down at the Corner Beer Joint" (going home to mother as non-joke); on the man's, "It's Not Supposed to Be That Way" (but it is) and "Pick Up the Tempo" (on the rebound). What's more, Nelson's combination of soft-spoken off-key and battered honky-tonk matches the bare, responsive country music Jerry Wexler has gotten out of the Muscle Shoals regulars. Payoff: the two Mike Lewis string arrangements are actually climactic. A-

Brighter and more uptempo than Wake of the Flood (which is not to claim it's "high energy"), with almost as many memorable tunes as American Beauty. Robert Hunter is not progressing, however--even "U.S. Blues," an entertaining collection of conceits, seems received rather than found. And a Weir-Barlow song about money is just one more way for rich Marin hippies to put women down. B-

>>128200406
this guy really did think he was smarter and cooler than everybody else, didn't he?

Browne reminds me of Nixon: no matter how hard I listen to his pronouncements--important sociologically if nothing else, right?--my mind begins to wander. They're getting longer, too; the eight songs here average over five minutes. I admit that the longest is also the best, an intricate extended metaphor called "Fountain of Sorrow." But his linguistic gentility is inappropriate, his millenarianism is self-indulgent, and only if he sang as good as Dylan Thomas might I change my mind. B-

>>128199447
STICKY!!!

>>128199616
technically 49. the album was actually released in 73 in non-US markets and 74 in US.

Suzi Quatro is hot.

My friend who goes to discos tells me the Jacksons are the first major artists to put out a real disco album--designed for dancers, and listeners be damned. This may well be true--certainly the guitars and electric keyboards are more noteworthy than the singing. He also tells me it's the Jacksons' best album since who knows when, and what's surprising is that he's right again. This is a tribute to the aforementioned instruments, but the singing is fine, and if a lot of the songs live up to the album title, that ain't necessarily bad. For listeners (dancers too): "What You Don't Know." B+

Keyboard player (and now vocalist) H.W. Casey and bassman Richard Finch made so much moolah for T.K. prexy Henry Stone that he told them they could spend as much as $3150 on their own LP. What they come up with is the real Miami sound--the sensual Latin accents that really are sensual in New Orleans sound altogether more hyped-up here. "Queen of Clubs" was a smash in the Queen's clubs, while "Sound Your Funky Horn" and "I'm a Pushover" have creased America's soul charts, which makes three hooks right here. A weirdo and a sleeper. B+

She sounds like herself on several cuts and Bette Midler on one, but she also sounds tired, and for the most part this is as inflated as the worst Airplane. I wonder too why she participates as neither writer nor vocalist on "It's Only Music" (not that I'd want to be associated with it myself). But the title demands to be committed to print. C

>>128199395 (OP)
So much amazing stuff coming out. Imagine how great music's gonna be in 50 years time!

>>128211634
and anon said this was the weakest year of the decade yet

>>128208783
>>128199616
Fuck you 50s schizo.

>>128211229
why does nobody ever remember this band for some reason?

>>128201406
>censored US cover
And it was technically actually a '73 release.

#BLACKED

>>128202520
what's the deal with Todd Rundgren, maaan?

>>128202541
still better than anything he did in 75 onward

What made Wonder's last two albums so gorgeous was the carefree indecorum of the ballads, which broke the rules with supremely indulgent self-confidence and only became more beautiful as a result. But this time the slow ones are less carefree than aimless. Only "They Won't Go When I Go" gets lost altogether, and most reveal substantial charms in the end, but we really shouldn't have to look so hard for them. The two great cuts, meanwhile, get across mostly on momentum--"You Haven't Done Nothin'," about "the nightmare/That's becomin' real life," and "Boogie On Reggae Woman," about boogieing on. A-

>>128210310
there's a lot of H&O that Cuckgau didn't review probably almost half their albums

The critic in me has no doubt that this is their best album, although he notes that the male-bonding songs (which articulate an affirmative ethos) have more to say than the female-separation songs (which rationalize hostility into pity/contempt). And when the critic plays the record, the listener enjoys the Gram Parsons tribute "My Man," the MOR-oriented "Best of My Love," the vaguely anti-authoritarian "On the Border," the permanently star-struck "James Dean," and several others. But the listener is too turned off by what the band represents ever to put the thing on voluntarily. B+