Trollheart Listens to Every Album on Wiki's List for 2017

Trollheart · 03-01-2018, 10:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Oriphiel

You reviewed an album called El Dorado, and didn't make any ELO jokes?

*TH's Dad Joke level decreases by 5*

These philistines wouldn't have understood. Plus I put up that review at about 3am or so.

Trollheart · 03-01-2018, 02:00 PM

Album title: Diversions Vol 4: The Songs and Poems of Molly Drake/ The Songs and Poems of Molly Drake: Extras
Artist: The Unthanks
Genre: Folk
Nationality: English
Release date: May 26
Position in Discography: Eighth
Estimated Rating:

Have I heard of this artist? No
Average RYM Score: 3.22/3.12
I guess for those of you (and I know there are a lot of you) who are into Nick Drake's music, this will mean a lot more, as this is an album of songs and poems written by his mother, but I'm not a particular fan of his. Like Elliott Smith, I think his music is okay but I don't get the sometimes almost hero-worship both receive here. That's fine: you guys do you, no problem. But just so you understand I'm not jumping up and down about the release of this album as perhaps some of you might be. So what's it like? Well, it's soft, wistful, gentle, as you'd probably expect; the two Unthanks sisters harmonising well and the piano and violins complementing them nicely. The addition of poems, spoken at the end of some of the tracks, lends the music a particular gravity and majesty.

Some, like “Martha”, are simply spoken poems without any music backing at all, and others, like the beautifully fragile “How Wild the Wind Blows”, are songs without any poetry. The album probably works best when the two are combined, but each can stand very well independent of the other. Sometimes, when used together, the song begins first and is followed by the poem (“What Can a Song Do to You?”) and sometimes the other way around, with the poem being spoken and then the music/song following (“Bird in the Blue”) but neither ever overwhelms the other, both working perfectly in concert with each other. Her poetry is spoken by Molly's daughter, Gabrielle.

Naturally, as you'd expect, it's all very low-key, quite morose and sad, and at times I found that getting to me. Misty-eyed remembrances, regrets and soulful confessions are all very well – and they're very well presented here by the Unthanks – but it can get a little wearing. In some ways, maybe, it's like listening to someone pouring out their troubles to you endlessly. You may sympathise with the person, but after a while you just want to say “Cheer up, for ****'s sake!” Not that I mean to cheapen or mock the very real emotions being expressed here, but a little light relief now and then would have been nice. Okay, well “Soft Shelled Crabs” kind of relieves the sadness and bitterness somewhat; good song with some fairly lively violin.

The album was released simultaneously with a second, smaller one subtitled “Extras”, so I'm reviewing both here at once. Seems to be more of the same, so I'm not quite sure why they bothered. If they wanted to include these then perhaps they should have just extended the album (it is, after all, a mere fifteen tracks) instead of making a separate album of these. But whatever: there are short songs, short poems, perhaps “Two Worlds” being the most personal with respect to the death of her son, as I understand it, and the harmonies on “Poor Mum” are lovely, but again it's all very downbeat and kind of depressing. Ah well, that's the Drakes for you I guess, and they had plenty to be depressed about. Interesting album, but not really for me.

Check out more from this artist? Probably not
Check out more from this genre or subgenre? Yes

Actual Rating:

Trollheart · 03-01-2018, 03:48 PM

Album title: Dream Pt.01
Artist: Astro
Genre: K-pop
Nationality: Korean
Release date: May 29
Position in Discography: Fourth
Estimated Rating:

Have I heard of this artist? No
Average RYM Score: 2.17
And so we end May as we began, as we seem to begin every month, with a dose of K-pop. Honestly, when this starts I think I'm listening to Whistle's “Just Buggin”, but unfortunately, though that would be an infinitely preferable pastime, it's actually “Dreams Come True”. If they did, then I wouldn't have to listen to crap like this but there we go. And how I wish I could. Go, that is. Still, as I said several times before, the one saving grace of K-pop is that the albums are almost always EPs (or mini-albums, as they call them) and rarely have more than eight or ten tracks. This has eight, which is of course eight too many. Great: I've just seen they released another of these later on in the year. Can't wait for that.

Check out more from this artist? No
Check out more from this genre or subgenre? No

Actual Rating:

Trollheart · 03-01-2018, 06:17 PM

Album title: Bittersweet
Artist: Baek a-Yeon
Genre: K-pop
Nationality: Korean
Release date: May 29
Position in Discography: Third EP
Estimated Rating:

Have I heard of this artist? No
Average RYM Score: 2.79
And the final album for this month is a K-pop EP from a Korean Idol finalist. Well, at least it has a less dancy, more acoustic, almost sixties pop feel to it when it begins, and she's a decent singer, but sure aren't they all? Isn't that part of the problem? They're all good singers, good looking, from (presumably) good families, who chain themselves and their future to the big K-pop hit factory corporations and become a cog in the machine, ending up all sounding pretty much the same and with little to no control over their music. Also, it's ****. See you next month.

Check out more from this artist? No
Check out more from this genre or subgenre? No

Actual Rating:

Trollheart · 03-02-2018, 11:24 AM

That's May wrapped up then. Just time for the stats and top twenties before I move on.

And here they are.

Out of a total of 117 albums reviewed:

Albums I considered excellent: 35
Albums I considered good: 32
Albums I considered meh: 24
Albums I considered bad: 6
Albums I considered terrible: 18

Albums I did not complete

Ones on which I used the "Oh Hell No!" clause: 0
Ones on which I used the "Three Strikes" clause: 0
Ones on which I used the "Bailout" clause: 2

**Frownland** · 03-02-2018, 11:44 AM

Jessica Moss - Pools of Light
Elliott Sharp, Mary Halvorson, and Marc Ribot - Err Guitar
Ruins of Beverast - Exuvia

Trollheart · 03-02-2018, 11:47 AM

My Top Twenty for May

1. The Mountain Goats – Goths
2. Snoop Dogg – Neva Left
3. Alestorm – No Grave But the Sea
4. Brother Ali – All the Beauty in This Whole Life
5. Paula Arenas – Matices
6. The BBC Radiophonic Workshop – Burials in Several Earths
7. Arve Henriksen – Towards Language
8. Slowdive – Slowdive
9. Goo Goo Dolls – You Should Be Happy
10. Todd Rundgren – White Knight
11. The Underachievers – Renaissance
12. Café Tacvba - Jei Beibi
13. Logic – Everybody
14. Chris Price – Stop Talking
15. Wear Your Wounds – Dunedevil
16. Esham – Scribble
17. Jane Weaver – Modern Kosmology
18. Carl Craig – Versus
19. Ingrid Michaelson – Alter Egos
20. Chris Stapleton – From a Room, Volume 1

Honourable Mentions:

Blondie – Pollinator
Sarah P – Who Am I?
Rawsrvnt – Shut it Down
Do Make Say Think – Stubborn Persistent Illusions
Ozomatli – Non-Stop: Mexico to Jamaica
The Afghan Whigs – In Spades

My Bottom Twenty for April

1. Dragonforce – Reaching into Infinity
2. Bryson Tiller – True to Self
3. Harry Styles – Harry Styles
4. Psy – 4x2=8
5. At The Drive-In – Inter Alia
6. Mac DeMarco – This Old Dog
7. Warrant – Louder Faster Harder
8. Oceano – Revelation
9. Scale the Summit – In a World of Fear
10. New Kids On The Block – Thankful
11. Jin – Black Origami
12. Kid Ink – 7 Series
13. FO&O – FO&O
14. B.o.B – Ether
15. Robin Trower – Time and Emotion
16. Dean Lewis – Same Kind of Different
17. LeToya Luckett – Back2Life
18. Paramore – After Laughter
19. R5 - New Addictions
20. PWR BTTM – Pageant

Dishonourable Mentions:

T-Pain/Lil Wayne – T-Wayne
!!! - Shake the Shudder
Juana Molina – Halo
Twice – Signal
Vixx – Shangri-La

Trollheart · 03-02-2018, 11:48 AM

JUNE

[Index for June, part one]

Trollheart · 03-02-2018, 11:48 AM

[index for June, part two]

Trollheart · 03-02-2018, 11:49 AM

[Index for June, part three, if required]

03-01-2018, 02:00 PM	#2012 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,994	Album title: Diversions Vol 4: The Songs and Poems of Molly Drake/ The Songs and Poems of Molly Drake: Extras Artist: The Unthanks Genre: Folk Nationality: English Release date: May 26 Position in Discography: Eighth Estimated Rating: Have I heard of this artist? No Average RYM Score: 3.22/3.12 I guess for those of you (and I know there are a lot of you) who are into Nick Drake's music, this will mean a lot more, as this is an album of songs and poems written by his mother, but I'm not a particular fan of his. Like Elliott Smith, I think his music is okay but I don't get the sometimes almost hero-worship both receive here. That's fine: you guys do you, no problem. But just so you understand I'm not jumping up and down about the release of this album as perhaps some of you might be. So what's it like? Well, it's soft, wistful, gentle, as you'd probably expect; the two Unthanks sisters harmonising well and the piano and violins complementing them nicely. The addition of poems, spoken at the end of some of the tracks, lends the music a particular gravity and majesty. Some, like “Martha”, are simply spoken poems without any music backing at all, and others, like the beautifully fragile “How Wild the Wind Blows”, are songs without any poetry. The album probably works best when the two are combined, but each can stand very well independent of the other. Sometimes, when used together, the song begins first and is followed by the poem (“What Can a Song Do to You?”) and sometimes the other way around, with the poem being spoken and then the music/song following (“Bird in the Blue”) but neither ever overwhelms the other, both working perfectly in concert with each other. Her poetry is spoken by Molly's daughter, Gabrielle. Naturally, as you'd expect, it's all very low-key, quite morose and sad, and at times I found that getting to me. Misty-eyed remembrances, regrets and soulful confessions are all very well – and they're very well presented here by the Unthanks – but it can get a little wearing. In some ways, maybe, it's like listening to someone pouring out their troubles to you endlessly. You may sympathise with the person, but after a while you just want to say “Cheer up, for **'s sake!” Not that I mean to cheapen or mock the very real emotions being expressed here, but a little light relief now and then would have been nice. Okay, well “Soft Shelled Crabs” kind of relieves the sadness and bitterness somewhat; good song with some fairly lively violin. The album was released simultaneously with a second, smaller one subtitled “Extras”, so I'm reviewing both here at once. Seems to be more of the same, so I'm not quite sure why they bothered. If they wanted to include these then perhaps they should have just extended the album (it is, after all, a mere fifteen tracks) instead of making a separate album of these. But whatever: there are short songs, short poems, perhaps “Two Worlds” being the most personal with respect to the death of her son, as I understand it, and the harmonies on “Poor Mum” are lovely, but again it's all very downbeat and kind of depressing. Ah well, that's the Drakes for you I guess, and they had plenty to be depressed about. Interesting album, but not really for me. Check out more from this artist? Probably not Check out more from this genre or subgenre? Yes Actual Rating:** __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

03-01-2018, 03:48 PM	#2013 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,994	Album title: Dream Pt.01 Artist: Astro Genre: K-pop Nationality: Korean Release date: May 29 Position in Discography: Fourth Estimated Rating: Have I heard of this artist? No Average RYM Score: 2.17 And so we end May as we began, as we seem to begin every month, with a dose of K-pop. Honestly, when this starts I think I'm listening to Whistle's “Just Buggin”, but unfortunately, though that would be an infinitely preferable pastime, it's actually “Dreams Come True”. If they did, then I wouldn't have to listen to crap like this but there we go. And how I wish I could. Go, that is. Still, as I said several times before, the one saving grace of K-pop is that the albums are almost always EPs (or mini-albums, as they call them) and rarely have more than eight or ten tracks. This has eight, which is of course eight too many. Great: I've just seen they released another of these later on in the year. Can't wait for that. Check out more from this artist? No Check out more from this genre or subgenre? No Actual Rating: __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

03-01-2018, 06:17 PM	#2014 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,994	Album title: Bittersweet Artist: Baek a-Yeon Genre: K-pop Nationality: Korean Release date: May 29 Position in Discography: Third EP Estimated Rating: Have I heard of this artist? No Average RYM Score: 2.79 And the final album for this month is a K-pop EP from a Korean Idol finalist. Well, at least it has a less dancy, more acoustic, almost sixties pop feel to it when it begins, and she's a decent singer, but sure aren't they all? Isn't that part of the problem? They're all good singers, good looking, from (presumably) good families, who chain themselves and their future to the big K-pop hit factory corporations and become a cog in the machine, ending up all sounding pretty much the same and with little to no control over their music. Also, it's **. See you next month. Check out more from this artist? No Check out more from this genre or subgenre? No Actual Rating:** __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

03-02-2018, 11:24 AM	#2015 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,994	That's May wrapped up then. Just time for the stats and top twenties before I move on. And here they are. Out of a total of 117 albums reviewed: Albums I considered excellent: 35 Albums I considered good: 32 Albums I considered meh: 24 Albums I considered bad: 6 Albums I considered terrible: 18 Albums I did not complete Ones on which I used the "Oh Hell No!" clause: 0 Ones on which I used the "Three Strikes" clause: 0 Ones on which I used the "Bailout" clause: 2 __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

03-02-2018, 11:44 AM	#2016 (permalink)
Frownland SOPHIE FOREVER Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: East of the Southern North American West Posts: 35,541	Jessica Moss - Pools of Light Elliott Sharp, Mary Halvorson, and Marc Ribot - Err Guitar Ruins of Beverast - Exuvia __________________ Studies show that when a given norm is changed in the face of the unchanging, the remaining contradictions will parallel the truth. d e a f b o x

03-02-2018, 11:47 AM	#2017 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,994	My Top Twenty for May 1. The Mountain Goats – Goths 2. Snoop Dogg – Neva Left 3. Alestorm – No Grave But the Sea 4. Brother Ali – All the Beauty in This Whole Life 5. Paula Arenas – Matices 6. The BBC Radiophonic Workshop – Burials in Several Earths 7. Arve Henriksen – Towards Language 8. Slowdive – Slowdive 9. Goo Goo Dolls – You Should Be Happy 10. Todd Rundgren – White Knight 11. The Underachievers – Renaissance 12. Café Tacvba - Jei Beibi 13. Logic – Everybody 14. Chris Price – Stop Talking 15. Wear Your Wounds – Dunedevil 16. Esham – Scribble 17. Jane Weaver – Modern Kosmology 18. Carl Craig – Versus 19. Ingrid Michaelson – Alter Egos 20. Chris Stapleton – From a Room, Volume 1 Honourable Mentions: Blondie – Pollinator Sarah P – Who Am I? Rawsrvnt – Shut it Down Do Make Say Think – Stubborn Persistent Illusions Ozomatli – Non-Stop: Mexico to Jamaica The Afghan Whigs – In Spades My Bottom Twenty for April 1. Dragonforce – Reaching into Infinity 2. Bryson Tiller – True to Self 3. Harry Styles – Harry Styles 4. Psy – 4x2=8 5. At The Drive-In – Inter Alia 6. Mac DeMarco – This Old Dog 7. Warrant – Louder Faster Harder 8. Oceano – Revelation 9. Scale the Summit – In a World of Fear 10. New Kids On The Block – Thankful 11. Jin – Black Origami 12. Kid Ink – 7 Series 13. FO&O – FO&O 14. B.o.B – Ether 15. Robin Trower – Time and Emotion 16. Dean Lewis – Same Kind of Different 17. LeToya Luckett – Back2Life 18. Paramore – After Laughter 19. R5 - New Addictions 20. PWR BTTM – Pageant Dishonourable Mentions: T-Pain/Lil Wayne – T-Wayne !!! - Shake the Shudder Juana Molina – Halo Twice – Signal Vixx – Shangri-La __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

03-02-2018, 11:48 AM	#2018 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,994	JUNE [Index for June, part one] __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

03-02-2018, 11:48 AM	#2019 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,994	[index for June, part two] __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

03-02-2018, 11:49 AM	#2020 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,994	[Index for June, part three, if required] __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018