Obsessively chronicling one man’s exploration of popular music.
Welcome to Aphoristic Album Reviews, where I discuss highlights from the last sixty years of popular music. I write album reviews, highlight my favourite albums, blog regularly, and make lists.
Recent Album Review Pages
10,000 Maniacs
1980s folk-pop
Natalie Prass
Virginian sophisti-pop
Natalie Merchant
10,000 Maniac goes solo
Albums Ranked From Worst To Best
What’s Tom Waits’ least impressive album? What’s Kate Bush’s best record?
Recent Blog Posts
10 Best Jessie Ware Songs
UK’s most likeable pop star, Jessie Ware is charming where other mainstream acts leave me cold. She has a gorgeous voice, but she’s closer to the sophisticated poise of Sade than the vocal histrionics of Celine Dion. Ware’s body of…
Music Quiz: ‘The’ Bands
Congratulations to Tony, who caffeined up and motored through last week’s Flip Flop albums quiz. This week is straightforward after last time’s visual hysteria. You just need to name the band given the song. I scored 35/38 – I…
New Music Reviews: Lucy Dacus, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Erika de Casier
I’ve been finding lots of albums in the good to very good range this year, but not many great ones. Here are three more strong, but not classic, albums. American indie rock artist Lucy Dacus, Canadian post-rockers Godspeed You! Black…
Nuggets: (Would I Still Be) Her Big Man by The Brigands
Before he became Patti Smith’s lead guitarist, Lenny Kaye compiled Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era. Released in 1972, the two-LP set covered American garage rock and psychedelia from the years 1965-1968 and was a major influence on…
Music Quiz: Flip Flop Albums
Congratulatons to EclecticMusicLover, who easily won last week’s never had a #1 single. He scored 26/29, 3 ahead of J’s 23, while no one else scored over 20. This week’s quiz is a little confusing. You need to select the…
Singapore by Girls Aloud: Great B-Sides
Lots of dedicated music fans are sniffy about mainstream pop music from the 21st century. And if there’s anything worse, it’s 21st-century mainstream pop that was pre-fabricated for a TV show. Girls Aloud originated from the reality show Popstars: The…
Popular Blog Posts
10 Worst Songs of the 1980s
When I was a teenager in the 1990s, the 1980s were often reviled as the decade that taste forgot. But I think this list is far less heinous than the 10 Worst Songs of the 1970s – the corporate vibes…
Taylor Swift’s Albums: Ranked from Worst to Best
Taylor Swift is a mega-star, and her profile as a celebrity can overshadow her musical abilities. Opinions on Swift are wildly diverse – in some quarters she’s dismissed as disposable music for teenage girls. In others she’s highly respected as…
10 Worst Song Lyrics of All Time
Unless you’re Leonard Cohen or Gil-Scott Heron, lyrics in popular music are a secondary concern. Normally I’m happy to bop along to the music, and don’t mind if the lyrics aren’t profound. But sometimes the words are too jarring too…
