Average Rating: 4.36 Rating Variance: 0.18 Objectivity Score: 40% (Poorly Balanced)
Sort by: Rating | Release Date | Rating Date | Name5.0 classicDavid Bowie The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From MarsThe fifth studio album is Bowie's definitive commercial breakthrough, offering a focused irresistible set of songs coping about an androgynous bisexual alien ("Moonage daydream") performing a suicide parable-like mission on a soon to collapse planet Earth ("Five years") in which he assimilates the earthlings' cultural features from love ("Soul love") to mass appeal allure ("Starman", "Star") utilising music as a crucial medium for communication and mutual identification ("Lady Stardust") but also sexual fulfillment ("Hang on to yourself"), questioning if this consuming lifestyle is worth ("Suffragette city") and ending to self destruct in the artificiality and futility of the path the alien chose ("Ziggy Stardust", "Rock'n'roll suicide"). This is not a concept album, neither a rock opera, as the overall will of making this character's epopee fit with previously recorded tracks only vaguely emerges in the final product. That said, Ziggy Stardust, this smart western version of japanese kabuki theatre figures, is the only fully succeeded Bowie's character, so much that he risked of confusing his own identity in it, till that infamous Hammersmith Odeon concert on July 3 1973 in which David killed Ziggy. We can also point out that the forced tale behind this record is not that original, as a messianic catalyzer destined to self destruction for the salvage of mankind has permeated our civilization for at least 2000 years and in rock music it's just what The Who's Tommy did a couple of years before the Bowie's album release. So, though the album lyrics work beautifully, it's in music that this record is relevant, having Bowie contrived an exciting and, by then, futuristic form of proto punk or at least garage rock enlighted with the elegance and pomposity of the rising glam rock, cleverly blending all his diverse influences, not only Velvet Underground, Marc Bolan, Iggy Pop, Elton John or Mott the Hoople but also confirming his own musical language already fully matured on the precedent lp "Hunky Dory”.Johnny Winter Second WinterQueen A Night at the OperaFolded by managerial tribulations and resentment over lack of profit despite their ascending career, the band relies on new manager John Reid and delivers its best album, experimenting beyond the recording techniques possibilities and unraveling in the most disparate musical genres. The lp marks the full maturation of Brian May's identitary skills, surpassing himself in a painstaking guitar work, with which he demonstrates his total mastery over the instrument effects. This album is treated with so much care to appear lighter than Queen's previous records. The hard rock theatre of "Death on two legs" releases all its acrimony toward Queen's past manager Norman Sheffield, with big dramatic choirs and a razor-sharp guitar that build a riotous misleading atmosphere. "Lazing on a sunday afternoon" is a quiet '20s styled interlude about a fantasized dandy's chronicle. In "I'm in love with my car" Roger Taylor finally finds his authorial dimension, building an epic with this telling of an obsessive love for a sport car, one of the juvenile fetishes the drummer has treated about in that rock'n'roll decantation which was his main concern in early Queen's outings. The marital reliance of "You're my best friend" confirms John Deacon's melodic acumen, while "'39" is a poetic country-folk that differs treating a unusual sci-fi topic, in a relaxed, busking styled mood. "Sweet lady" is a polished hard rock pièce that touches Jimi Hendrix's "Crosstown traffic". "Seaside rendezvous" is another Belle-Epoque oldie with a playful fingertips tip-tap. In "The prothet's song" May conveys japanese koto, dropped D guitar and ever-changing chord solutions in the fulfillment of a grandiose musical statement. "Love of my life" is a pianistic minuet with a perfectly orchestrated lead guitar, embellished by harp flourishes. "Good company" showcases the vast catalog of May's guitar timbres, with an overflowing dixieland finale. The album manifesto remains "Bohemian Rhapsody", landmark of Freddie Mercury's ambition and ego. Its production took weeks of hard, mad work and more than 180 vocal overdubs to the point of risking the consumption of the recording tape.4.5 superbEagles DesperadoLed Zeppelin Led Zeppelin IIIAiming to pause the busy working schedule that launched them in precocious super stardom, in the early spring of 1970 Led Zeppelin took time to relocate to the remote Bron-Y-Aur cottage in the welsh park of Snowdonia, where they came up with the acoustic disempowerment of their sound that is the more evident newness about their third studio album. The record is concretely halfway between what was before and what will be in the future and it represents their proper career turning point, as well as an ambitions fulfiller. We have the proto metal pounders we were used to ("Out on the tiles"), but more adventurously departing from blues rock than the past, getting sumptuous and oniric in "Immigrant song" or psychedelic/'50s rockabilly retro in "Celebration day". In this third lp the Zep's blues basic element is more polished and refined, masterfully condensate in the indulgent manifesto "Since I've been loving you". The acoustic injection comprises dark middle eastern textures ("Friends", with its inventive guitar tuning - one of Page's favorite tracks of the lp - and a hunting orchestration arranged by Jones), a relaxed protest modern folk exercise that is aware of Joni Mitchell's work ("That's the way"), some country languors ("Tangerine", "Bron-Y-Aur stomp") and two traditionals, the rhythmed build-up of "Gallows pole" (with Page debuting on banjo) and the deconstructed delta blues of "Hats off to (Roy) Harper". At the time of the album release, its overall laid back flow shocked the band's hard rock fans and channeled bad reviews, ending up in the shortest chart life among the first five Zeppelin records. Nonetheless the new elements cemented in a definitive way in the Led Zeppelin sound becoming their adjusted broadened trademark and the subsequent three albums - which all benefit from that evolution - will be received with wide praise.4.0 excellentBilly Joel 52nd StreetA Grammy award winner album, Billy Joel’s 6th studio album, "52nd street" takes its name from the famed New York jazz district, where the lp was actually recorded. The sound is broader than previous releases, with a selection of tracks very diverse the one from the other, not to mention that Joel's playing sounds particularly enthusiastic. "Big shot" starts the album with a bang, marked by a solid rock motif. "Honesty" assumes the role of the big glossy ballad designed to be released as a single and has established itself as a classic of its genre, countlessly covered by other artists. "My life" possesses a killer pulsating piano groove and an airy accessible feel, being definitely one of the most effective radio friendly pop tunes written by Joel. The tango and jazz tour de force of "Zanzibar" closes side 1 with big contentment for the listener. The masochistic lover addiction of "Stiletto" is another winning piano rhythm and a soothing driving sax solo looms above that. "Rosalinda's eyes" remembers some faux-latin arranged number by Elton John, while "Half a mile away" is another pastiche, mixing horns driven yacht rock and '50s r'n'b. The epic "Until the night" acts unofficially as the album demise, leaving afterwards just a post scriptum divertissement in the form of the title track shuffle.Free FreeAlmost entirely written by the Fraser/Rodgers partnership, Free's second studio album sold poorly even if the material is among the best the rock blues scene had to offer at the time of its release. "I'll be creeping" builds a sophisticated theme about the blues recurring figure of the possessive lover. "Songs of yesterday" is strictly led by the bass, from which the tune has been composed, and benefits from appropriate time changes and a free rein storming performance by Paul Kossoff. "Lying in the sunshine" is a beautiful muffled acoustic intermission, like a lazy summer nap, where we can enjoy a different canon in precious Rodgers' vocals, backed by a somewhat slightly doo-wop chorus. Some more exciting hard blues comes with the quartet penned "Trouble on double time" with another blues lyrical theme, this time the relentless cheater leading a double life. "Mouthful of grass" is the second interesting bracket from the rock clamour and closes side one. "Woman", the best song in the selection, is gifted with an amazing big guitar riff that just anticipates the pop rock consecration of "All right now" even if at halved tempo. "Free me" and "Mourning sad morning" have a liturgical feel enhanced with layered vocal harmonies. "Broad daylight" is constructed to launch its glorious chorus, as a Joe Cocker hit single allusion, but failed miserably in the charts. In the end this record set the things right, pointing how Free was not yet another mere blues rock act, but a major british popular music crafting act to be, with top class authors and enviable performing skills, but sadly internal misunderstandings and mixed fortunes prevented this fantastic band to consolidate its position.Genesis Wind & WutheringJoni Mitchell BlueThat cover shot says it all: an intense inner narrative, tinged with the blue of melancholy and regret, on a path of self-analysis that from afar regain what is near, rediscovering what makes us ourselves. This record is one of the most outspoken confessions put together by an artist, in which an unguarded Joni lays bare that troubled time marked by the end of his love story with Graham Nash, the difficult new relationship with James Taylor and her escape vacation through Europe. The instrumentation is kept as usual to a minimum and that combines perfectly with the intimate matter treated in the selection. Appalachian dulcimer, guitar and piano are the solitary tools that weave tunes as introspective as solemn, the result of a musical genius that here pushes as far as possible the folk format before dedicating to more challenging forms and genres that could suit better the continuing development of Joni's boundless talent. "All I want" is a hopelessly romantic insight in her story with Taylor where the author struggles to sustain the love ambition even with all the turbulence she was experiencing. The track works masterfully, how the lyrics are fitted throughout the dulcimer strumming is really able to enhance and elevate the tune's signifiance. Another superb interweaving of words and musical fluency is the Nash dedicated "My old man". A more classic folk number, that brings us back to the past "Clouds" album, is the touching "Little green" that was conceived several years prior in the aftermath of her daughter's adoption process. After the cheerful intermission of "Carey", the pianistic intensity of the outstanding title track dives hard in then boyfriend James Taylor's issues and is the best Joni's performance in this record. "California" is the awareness of herself and the recovery at the end of this analysis record, while the cryptic "This flight tonight" is the elegy about lovers departure from which regret and hope equally spring. Then the albums stucks in a permanent slowness and essentially repeats its authorial formula for still good but weaker material than the aforementioned.Santana Santana IIILast album of the band’s first incarnation, it’s a soaring and vibrant, mostly instrumental, selection from a group of musicians trying to look tight as ever but, underneath the surface, torn apart by a life of excesses. The opening jam immediately exploits a fierce guitar shredding duel between Carlos and the new addition, twin-lead guitarist kid Neal Schon, which continues in the subsequent track “No one to depend on”, that really is in some sort the heaviest track up to that time by Santana, resulting in a ballsy thick hard rocking pounder acting as a forerunner to the wilder Journey’s ‘mark 1’ tracks to come. “Taboo” is a soulful episode characterized by a liquid atmosphere above a bluesy structure that just can have inspired the similar B.B. King’s “Ghetto woman” released a few months later that same year. Carlos’ mastery and gusto enlight the trademark number “Toussaint l’Overture”, where the guitar runs sumptuously on an infectious latin groove, probably one of the most heartfelt lead interventations ever operated on record by the band leader. Side 2 opens up with the fast soul of “Everybody’s everything” with a blasting prominent horn section and a ferocious solo by the new kid Neal acting like a beast looking for its tamer. The album passes to more latin territories from the salsa exercise of “Guajira” to the south american tinged tribal extravaganza of “Jungle strut”, pausing on the brazilian ballad “Everybody’s coming my way” (constructed on the same melody line of “Samba pa ti”) and concluding on a high with the incessant rumba of “Para los rumberos”. I think this is the less succeeded lp from the Santana’s first line-up, lacking both the genuine excitement of the first release and the imaginative songwriting of “Abraxas”, but it’s still a top notch statement from a terrific jaw-dropping bunch of guys that had built one of the best musical machines of all time.The Beatles Beatles for Sale
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