| 5.0 classic |
| Alabama Thunderpussy Open Fire |
| Be Bop Deluxe Sunburst Finish |
| Be Bop Deluxe Modern Music |
| Dave Edmunds Repeat When Necessary |
| Dave Edmunds D.E. 7th |
| Echolyn Cowboy Poems Free |
| Echolyn Mei |
| Elder (USA-MA) Dead Roots Stirring |
| Elder (USA-MA) Lore |
| Elder (USA-MA) Reflections of a Floating World |
| Elder (USA-MA) Omens |
| Elvis Costello This Year's Model |
| Helstar A Distant Thunder |
| Humble Pie Smokin' |
| A stone cold classic. One of the first albums I owned as a youth and I've never tired of it. The production and vibe of the album is unmatched; you can feel the presence of the instruments and voices like you're right there in the studio with them. |
| IQ Dark Matter |
| IQ Frequency |
| Jethro Tull Thick as a Brick |
| Jethro Tull A Passion Play |
| Jethro Tull Songs from the Wood |
| Manowar Hail To England |
| Manowar Sign Of The Hammer |
| Mike LePond's Silent Assassins Mike LePond's Silent Assassins |
| Who knew the bassist from Symphony X was such a big Manowar/power metal fan? This stuff fits right into that genre and kicks major butt. Lepond is even the touring bassist with former Manowar guitarist Ross the Boss now! |
| Pagan's Mind Celestial Entrance |
| Pagan's Mind Enigmatic: Calling |
| Pagan's Mind Infinity Divine |
| Pagan's Mind God's Equation |
| Pagan's Mind Live Equation |
| Pagan's Mind Full Circle |
| Pink Floyd Wish You Were Here |
| Porcupine Tree In Absentia |
| Porcupine Tree Deadwing |
| Presto Ballet Peace Among the Ruins |
| Energetic, uplifting prog. The main influence I hear is Kansas (but no violin). Great stuff! |
| Raven Wiped Out |
| Raven All For One |
| Renaissance Live at Carnegie Hall |
| Rhapsody of Fire Dawn Of Victory |
| Rush Moving Pictures |
| Rush A Farewell To Kings |
| Rush Permanent Waves |
| Rush Signals |
| Rush Hemispheres |
| Spiritual Beggars Earth Blues |
| I've got their entire catalog and feel this is their best yet. The songs are accessible and inspired, the throaty organ sounds make it feel like 1973 again, and the guitar tone is gorgeous. I was not enamored of Apollo as the new singer on "Return to Zero"; the album was rather tame by their standards. But he's "on fire" here and this might be my favorite vocal performance on any SB album, and that's saying a lot. |
| Symphony X The Odyssey |
| Symphony X Paradise Lost |
| The Flower Kings Unfold the Future |
| The Flower Kings Flower Power |
| The Good Rats Tasty |
| The Good Rats From Rats to Riches |
| The Good Rats Ratcity in Blue |
| Tiles Presents of Mind |
| My favorite Tiles album - will satisfy any Rush fan who laments their modern cluttered, multi-layered sound and yearns for the days when their music used to breathe. Brainy Peart-like lyrics with classic Rush-like riffing. Terry Brown does a great job of "sweetening" the sound but unfortunately when you hear the live bonus tracks on their albums, you realize that as a live 3-piece they sound flat, unable to capture those Brown studio touches as well as duplicate the vocal harmonies. |
| Transatlantic SMPT:e |
| Transatlantic Bridge Across Forever |
| Transatlantic The Absolute Universe |
| Transatlantic The Absolute Universe...(Extended Version) |
| Wo Fat The Singularity |
| Yes Relayer |
| Yes Close to the Edge |
| One of the grand achievements of progressive rock that still stands the test of time. You had to be there hearing this in real time, trying to wrap your head around the complexity, lyrics, musicianship, arrangements and emotion, so unlike anything else you'd heard before. |
| Zero Hour The Towers of Avarice |
| 4.0 excellent |
| Agent Steel Skeptics Apocalypse |
| Agent Steel Unstoppable Force |
| Agent Steel Omega Conspiracy |
| Agent Steel Order Of The Illuminati |
| Agent Steel Alienigma |
| Agent Steel Mad Locust Rising |
| Artimus Pyledriver Artimus Pyledriver |
| Be Bop Deluxe Axe Victim |
| Be Bop Deluxe Drastic Plastic |
| Blue Cheer What Doesn't Kill You... |
| Blue Snaggletooth Dimension Thule |
| Bruce Springsteen Born in the U.S.A. |
| Bruce Springsteen Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. |
| Chicago Chicago II |
| Chicago Chicago III |
| Chicago Chicago V |
| Chicago Chicago VII |
| Chicago Chicago at Carnegie Hall |
| Dave Edmunds Twangin... |
| Earthless Sonic Prayer |
| Earthless Rhythms From A Cosmic Sky |
| Echolyn Suffocating the Bloom |
| Electric Mountain Electric Mountain |
| Great find, this 3-piece band from Mexico. Solid 70's retro sound with 3-piece dynamics like Black Sabbath or Grand Funk Railroad. The songs stretch out with instrumental passages based more on great riffing than flashy guitar soloing. The singer sounds a lot like the guy from Kyuss, who I can't stand, but this guy's voice doesn't bother me as strange as that sounds! Great woodchoppin' bass sound too. |
| Elvis Costello My Aim Is True |
| Elvis Costello Get Happy!! |
| Elvis Costello Trust |
| Explorers Club Age of Impact |
| Fu Manchu California Crossing |
| Fu Manchu King of the Road |
| Fu Manchu Signs Of Infinite Power |
| A definite improvement over the previous two disastrous albums, We Must Obey and Start the Machine! The guitar tones are thick and fuzzy again, the trippy elements have returned and the riffs are more plentiful. There are still moments where they reference the punk rock sound of the aforementioned albums, but for the most part this is solid Fu Manchu. |
| Fu Manchu Gigantoid |
| Solid FM. Yeah they're formulaic, but I like the formula. They harken back to some earlier styles though with some trippy sections, a nice surprise. The drumming is looser and wilder on this album too. |
| Fu Manchu Clone of the Universe |
| Gerard Power of Infinity |
| Helstar Rising From The Grave |
| Horslips The Táin |
| Horslips Happy to Meet – Sorry to Part |
| Horslips Dancehall Sweethearts |
| Humble Pie As Safe As Yesterday Is |
| Humble Pie Rock On |
| Humble Pie Rockin' the Fillmore: The Complete Recordings |
| Ice Age The Great Divide |
| Iluvatar A Story Two Days Wide |
| IQ Subterranea |
| IQ The Seventh House |
| IQ The Road of Bones |
| Jethro Tull Aqualung |
| Jethro Tull Minstrel in the Gallery |
| Jethro Tull Living in the Past |
| Journey Journey |
| Journey Look Into The Future |
| King's X Dogman |
| Lo-Pan Sasquanaut |
| Just got into these guys at the same time as Wo Fat. Lo-Pan... Wo Fat... sounds like I'm ordering at a Chinese restaurant! Killer sound though, picked up this and the Salvador album. |
| Lo-Pan Salvador |
| Lord Fowl Moon Queen |
| Magic Pie Circus of Life |
| Mos Generator Shadowlands |
| Neal Morse ? |
| Niacin Time Crunch |
| Opeth Ghost Reveries |
| Peter Frampton Frampton's Camel |
| Peter Frampton Somethin's Happening |
| Peter Frampton Frampton |
| Porcupine Tree Signify |
| Porcupine Tree Stupid Dream |
| Porcupine Tree Lightbulb Sun |
| Raven Rock Until You Drop |
| Raven Nothing Exceeds Like Excess |
| Raven Mad |
| Raven Heads Up |
| Raven ExtermiNation |
| Raven Metal City |
| Raven All Hell's Breaking Loose |
| Renaissance Prologue |
| Renaissance Ashes Are Burning |
| Renaissance Turn of the Cards |
| Renaissance Scheherazade and Other Stories |
| Renaissance Renaissance |
| Renaissance Illusion |
| Rhapsody of Fire Symphony Of Enchanted Lands |
| Rhapsody of Fire Legendary Tales |
| Rocket Scientists Brutal Architecture |
| Rockpile Seconds of Pleasure |
| Roine Stolt Wallstreet Voodoo |
| Rush 2112 |
| Rush Power Windows |
| Rush All The World's A Stage |
| Rush Rush In Rio |
| Rush Rush Replay X3 |
| Rush Clockwork Angels |
| Rush Vapor Trails Remixed |
| I like this a lot better now with the remix. So many textures come to the fore now. The original gave me such a headache that I couldn't listen to more than 3 tunes in a row before having to turn it off. |
| Sasquatch Sasquatch |
| Sasquatch III |
| So many times I hear a song on a stoner internet station that starts with a killer guitar riff... and then the vocals come in and kill it. Not these guys. They've got a major league vocalist to go along with their thunderous riffing, which puts them head and shoulders above their stoner contemporaries. They simply excel at every aspect of making this kind of music. This is the standard against which all other hard-n-heavy rock should be measured. |
| Sasquatch IV |
| A more compact offering than previous albums, but I do miss the acoustic tracks. "The Message" is not a good choice for the opening track, rather ordinary by their standards. Things get cooking after that. Killer sound, guitars and vocals rule and I don't care if they cop riffs. There's a bit in "Sweet Lady" that sounds like it comes from Humble Pie's "Four Day Creep" off Rockin' the Fillmore. Who cares, it sounds killer!rMy only other issue is some of the song lengths. "Wolves at My Door" and "Corner" are just 3 minutes and I wish they were a bit longer. "Smoke Signal" is 7:26 and the last two minutes are the repeated "Woo hoo hoo" vocals over repetitive riffs and guitar noise. It didn't need to go on that long. Only "Drawing Flies" at 7:41 works for me at that length as the melodies and riffs are quite dramatic. Overall a damn fine album, been cranking it in my car. |
| Sasquatch Maneuvers |
| Sleep Leagues Beneath |
| Sleep The Clarity |
| Sons of Otis Temple Ball |
| Sons of Otis X |
| Sons of Otis Exiled |
| Sons of Otis Seismic |
| Sons of Otis Isolation |
| Spiritual Beggars Ad Astra |
| Spiritual Beggars Mantra III |
| Spiritual Beggars Another Way To Shine |
| Spiritual Beggars Sunrise To Sundown |
| Spock's Beard V |
| Spock's Beard Day For Night |
| Starcastle Fountains of Light |
| Starcastle Starcastle |
| Steeleye Span Below the Salt |
| Steeleye Span A Parcel of Rogues |
| Steeleye Span Hark! The Village Wait |
| Steeleye Span Please To See The King |
| Steeleye Span Ten Man Mop |
| Symphony X The Divine Wings of Tragedy |
| Symphony X Twilight in Olympus |
| Symphony X The Damnation Game |
| Symphony X Underworld |
| The Bottle Rockets The Brooklyn Side |
| The Bottle Rockets Bottle Rockets |
| The Brought Low Third Record |
| Great blues/roots-rock out of Brooklyn with heavy Rolling Stones, Faces and Humble Pie influence. |
| The Brought Low Right on Time |
| The swagger of the Rolling Stones, the rollicking abandon of The Faces, the grit of Humble Pie... if you like those bands, you'll dig this! |
| The Flower Kings The Sum of No Evil |
| The Flower Kings Paradox Hotel |
| The Flower Kings Adam & Eve |
| The Flower Kings The Road Back Home |
| The Flower Kings Meet the Flower Kings |
| The Flower Kings Instant DeLIVEry |
| The Flower Kings Tour Kaputt |
| The Flower Kings Waiting For Miracles |
| The Flower Kings Islands |
| The Flower Kings By Royal Decree |
| The Good Rats Live at Last |
| The Monkees Headquarters |
| The Monkees Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd. |
| The Monkees The Birds The Bees & The Monkees |
| The Sword Warp Riders |
| The Sword Apocryphon |
| Transatlantic The Whirlwind |
| Transatlantic Live in Europe |
| U.K. U.K. |
| Wo Fat The Gathering Dark |
| Wo Fat Psychedelonaut |
| Wo Fat Noche del Chupacabra |
| Wo Fat The Conjuring |
| Yes Fragile |
| You had to be there, hearing this album in real time when it came out. There was nothing to compare it to. It was so "out there", so rich and complex and full of musical ideas that it was overwhelming. It loses points for the gratuitous solo pieces; with the exception of Steve Howe's amazing "Mood For a Day", they are largely forgettable. But the band tracks are still granite blocks of progressive rock that stand the test of time. |
| Yes Drama |
| Yes Yes: Live - 1975 at Q.P.R. |
| Zero Hour Dark Deceiver |
| Zero Hour Specs of Pictures Burnt Beyond |
| Zero Hour Metamorphosis |
| 2.5 average |
| Angel White Hot |
| Angel Sinful |
| Chicago Chicago X |
| Chicago Chicago VI |
| Chicago Chicago XI |
| Chicago Hot Streets |
| Emerson, Lake and Palmer Works Volume 1 |
| Emerson, Lake and Palmer Tarkus |
| Fu Manchu We Must Obey |
| Continues in the vein of "Start the Machine", which is basically Fu Manchu gone wrong. The songs are slightly better though, and a few have parts that sound like they're trying to reach back to their classic stoner sound (Shake It Loose, Land of Giants, Lesson) and Sensei vs. Sensei is a killer slow closing track, but there is still too much here that sounds like punk rock. |
| Grand Magus Iron Will |
| For me, this is a case of the whole being less than the sum of its parts. All the right ingredients are there: JB's killer voice (love his work in Spiritual Beggars), classic metal riffs, great sounding instruments, Nordic themes...so why don't I love this? It all seems...average. Safe, even. Too many mid-tempo songs that seem to blur together. Nothing really exciting or innovative about the arrangements; it's all very play-by-numbers. No ragged edges to the playing. Repetitive choruses that aren't very compelling - after I hear "silver into steel" repeated 4 times, that's enough, but it goes on and on. I bought this at the same time as Alabama Thunderpussy's "Open Fire" and ironically both bands have been in the "stoner" category earlier in their career but have morphed into a more classic metal/power metal sound. By contrast, I can't get enough of "Open Fire." It also has all the right ingredients but played with fire and passion, and with some cool instrumental breaks. It grabs my ear, whereas "Iron Will" just plods along and I find my interest drifting from boredom. Wish it wasn't so because I really wanted to like this album. |
| Grand Magus Hammer Of The North |
| Helstar The King of Hell |
| With their reunion they sound like a completely different band. James Rivera's voice is deeper and obviously he can't do the air-raid siren shrieks at his age. The overall sound production and playing is a lot heavier and the riffs even more complex. But what I don't like is the dark/evil/satanic imagery in the lyrics and artwork on all of the reunion albums, seems like a cheap, cliched gimmick to attract new fans considering they didn't go to that extreme in the 80's. Isn't it kind of ridiculous to be singing about this stuff in your 50's? |
| Helstar Twas the Night of a Helish X-Mas |
| Helstar This Wicked Nest |
| Helstar Vampiro |
| Horslips Short Stories - Tall Tales |
| Horslips Roll Back |
| Horslips The Unfortunate Cup of Tea! |
| Humble Pie Thunderbox |
| Burnt out from all the drugs that their success brought them, Thunderbox is the result. The recording lacks "oomph" in the production and Steve's voice especially is not well recorded. He was also short on inspiration with quite a few cover songs and not many originals. |
| Humble Pie On to Victory |
| Humble Pie Go for the Throat |
| IQ Nomzamo |
| IQ Are You Sitting Comfortably? |
| Jethro Tull Rock Island |
| Jethro Tull Catfish Rising |
| Jethro Tull Roots to Branches |
| Jethro Tull The Zealot Gene |
| King's X Please Come Home...Mr. Bulbous |
| King's X Black Like Sunday |
| King's X Manic Moonlight |
| Led Zeppelin Led Zeppelin III |
| Led Zeppelin Led Zeppelin |
| Led Zeppelin Led Zeppelin II |
| Manowar Warriors Of The World |
| Manowar Hell On Wheels |
| Manowar Battle Hymns MMXI |
| Manowar The Day the Earth Shook – The Absolute Power |
| Manowar The Dawn Of Battle |
| Opeth Heritage |
| Pink Floyd Animals |
| Rush Vapor Trails |
| Rush Rush |
| Spock's Beard The Kindness Of Strangers |
| Spock's Beard The Light |
| Spock's Beard Beware of Darkness |
| Symphony X Symphony X |
| The Good Rats The Good Rats |
| The Monkees Changes |
| The Monkees Pool It! |
| The Rolling Stones Exile on Main St. |
| Tiles Fly Paper |
| This album didn't grab me like earlier Tiles albums. As SkapalPes said in his review, the songwriting is weak here. Nothing really memorable, even with Alex Lifeson guesting on one track. |
| Yes The Ladder |
| Yes Tormato |
| Yes The Quest |
| 2.0 poor |
| Dave Edmunds Information |
| Dream Theater Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory |
| Emerson, Lake and Palmer Love Beach |
| Emerson, Lake and Palmer Works Volume 2 |
| Fu Manchu Start the Machine |
| Fu Manchu lost the plot with this one. The thick fuzz tones are gone and the songs sound more like punk rock than stoner rock - short songs without any adventurous jamming. "Hey" sounds like The Knack, and that's not a good thing! "Written in Stone" is a great opening track but it's all downhill from there. An uninspired effort. |
| Geddy Lee My Favourite Headache |
| Helstar Glory of Chaos |
| Humble Pie Street Rats |
| Tired, uninspired, just playing out the string. They made this after the record company rejected a completely different album which they submitted, so maybe the lack of motivation is understandable! (that other album surfaced in the 90's as the Scrubber Sessions, and was better than Street Rats). |
| Humble Pie Back on Track |
| A missed opportunity here. Before this was released, original members Jerry Shirley (drums) and Greg Ridley (bass) along with their first two guitarists (Peter Frampton, Clem Clempson) appeared on stage for a smokin' set at the Steve Marriott Memorial Concert. Why this lineup didn't go on to do a short tour and an album remains a mystery, as Frampton doesn't even mention the Marriott concert in his autobiography! Instead, this album only has Shirley and Ridley along with Bobby Tench (who played in a later version of the Pie) and Dave Colwell (who played in a Pie "tribute" band with Shirley). The songs with Ridley on lead vocals are decent, the rest doesn't sound much like Humble Pie. |
| Jethro Tull Too Old To Rock 'n' Roll: Too Young To Die! |
| Manowar Gods Of War |
| Manowar Hell On Stage |
| Metallica ...And Justice For All |
| Peter Frampton I'm In You |
| Pink Floyd The Dark Side Of The Moon |
| Raven The Pack Is Back |
| Rush Counterparts |
| Rush Working Men |
| The Sword High Country |
| Yes Open Your Eyes |
| Yes Magnification |
| Yes Mirror to the Sky |
