368. Peter Frampton - Frampton Comes Alive! (1976)

















Track Listing

1. Baby Something's Happening
2. Doobie Wah
3. Show Me The Way
4. It's A Plain Shame
5. All I Want To Be (Is By Your Side)
6. Wind Of Change
7. Baby I Love Your Way
8. I Wanna Go To The Sun
9. Penny For Your Thoughts
10. I'll Give You Money
11. Shine On
12. Jumpin' Jack Flash
13. Lines On My Face
14. Do You Feel Like We Do

Review

Here's Peter "fucking" Frampton. I can never think of him without reminding myself of High Fidelity: "Is That Peter Fucking Frampton?". That out of the way, you can see from the album picture that the man has a face that you really want to slap. After this you think: "Why is this the biggest selling live album in the history of live albums?". Then you think: "Man, people have poor taste indeed.".

The album is pretty terrible, it is dull, uninnovative (with the notable exception of the usage of talkbox) and dull. Had I said dull already? That's because it is. Oh and then it has as its great highlight Baby I Love Your Way... which is pretty bad.

It is paradoxical, however, that my favourite song of the album is also the longest one. The last track actually is a bit interesting, it has a pretty great bridge which lasts something like 10 minutes where Frampton makes extensive use of talkbox to the point where he gets to sound like Daft Punk... weird, I know. When the bridge ends and it kicks back into the main theme it is actually quite exhilarating. But an album doesn't live by just one song, and most other ones are bad... even tough there is also an interesting instrumental one there in the middle. Oh well, dispensable.

Track Highlights

1. Do You Feel Like We Do
2. Penny For Your Thoughts
3. Baby I Love Your way
4. Show Me The Way

Final Grade

6/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

* Referenced in Family Guy, season six, episode one. After being called a monster, Peter refers to the Frampton Comes Alive! album as being a monster.

* Referenced in Arrested Development, where a main character records an interracial Ventriloquism album, named Franklin Comes Alive.

* Appears in Wayne's World when Cassandra shows Wayne the old records that she has bought. When she asks Wayne if he's seen it before he claims to have been issued it as he lived in the suburbs, and that it came in the mail with samples of Tide.


Do You Feel Like We Do. Frampton does his best Daft Punk impression at around the 4 minute mark:

367. Stevie Wonder - Songs In The Key Of Life (1976)
















Track Listing

1 Love's in Need of Love Today
2 Have a Talk With God
3 Village Ghetto Land
4 Confusion
5 Sir Duke
6 I Wish
7 Knocks Me off My Feet
8 Pastime Paradise
9 Summer Soft
10 Ordinary Pain
11 Isn't She Lovely
12 Joy Inside My Tears
13 Black Man
14 Ngiculela-Es Una Historia-I Am Singing
15 If It's Magic
16 As
17 Another Star
18 Saturn
19 Ebony Eyes
20 All Day Sucker
21 Easy Goin' Evening (My Mama's Call)


Review

As you can see this is a long album and it is also the last truly great Stevie Wonder album in the "songs" format (Secret Life Of Plants is also quite good but mostly instrumental and some might say a bit too pretentious). So here we have a gigantic burst of great creativity by Wonder, and it is truly magnificent.

This album is magnificent not just because of its length of about 110 minutes but for the fact that there is not a bad song in the bunch. Some are obviously better than others but none is a dud, so if you put it next to the White Album it is truly amazing. This is possibly one of the best double albums of all time, up there with Blonde on Blonde and Lamb Lies Down On Broadway... so you can see how good that is and how diversified my music taste is... heh.

But it is not only the quality but the relentless pace of the album that makes it good. It never lets down for one single second, it is hard pumping soul all the way, even the slower tracks are only slow in comparison to the rest of the album, this is fun. This is a very fun, very political, very relentless and very good album. Impressive by its size and consistent quality calling this a masterpiece is no exageration. You will probably know many of the songs here from covers, well this is a testament to the influence of the album but it is also one of the problems with the album, maybe you are tired of Gangsta's Paradise (Pastime Paradise) or the George Michael and Mary J. Blige cover of As or even the song for Wild Wild West by Will Smith which is a reworking of I Wish. I can guarantee you however that the versions in this album are superior to any of the covers by astronomical magnitudes, so give them a chance.

Track Highlights

1. Sir Duke
2. As
3. Love's In Need Of Love Today
4. Knocks Me Off My Feet

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Songs in the Key of Life won a Grammy Award for Best Male Pop Vocal and Album of the Year. The album also topped Billboard's Pop Albums and Black Albums charts for a record breaking 14 weeks out its 44 week in the Top 40 alone, and was one of the first albums by a solo artist to debut at #1 in its first week of sales (Elton John released two albums in 1975 that entered the chart at #1). It has surpassed a total of 10 million units in the U.S. alone. It was voted as the best album of the year in The Village Voice's Pazz & Jop critics poll.

In 2003, the album was ranked number 56 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. Similarly, in 1998 Q magazine readers voted Songs in the Key of Life the 88th greatest album of all time; in 2001 the TV network VH1 placed it at number 7; in 2005 voters on the United Kingdom's Channel 4's poll placed it 74th.

A very short Sir Duke:

366. Peter Tosh - Legalize It (1976)
















Track Listing

1. Legalize It
2. Burial
3. What'cha Gonna Do?
4. No Sympathy
5. Why Must I Cry
6. Igziabeher (Let Jah Be Praised)
7. Ketchy Shuby
8. Till Your Well Runs Dry
9. Brand New Second Hand

Review

I am rapidly coming to the conclusion that no other Reggae acts are as good as Marley, and that he isn't famous just because. All other Reggae albums on the list until now have been quite disappointing.

This is another case of that, it is not bad music but it is quite dull, monotonous and uninspired. Peter Tosh is one of the founding members of the Wailers, and you can tell from the music that there is a lot of similarities with Marley. The thing is Tosh is the Haydn to Marley's Mozart, similar but without the spark of genius. (Yes, I mean Haydn and not Salieri, this isn't a cheap film analogy, it is actually a music one).

So Tosh... a bit of non-descriptive Reggae that will mainly appeal to stoners because of it's title track which would be cool if I was 15 and on dope. I am not 15 and unfortunately I am out of dope. So...

Track Highlights

1. Legalize It
2. Till Your Well Runs Dry
3. Brand New Second Hand
4. Burial

Final Grade

6/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

In 1987, Tosh appeared to be on the way to a career revival. He was awarded a Grammy for Best Reggae Performance in 1987 for No Nuclear War. However on September 11, 1987 three men came to his house demanding money, and when Tosh replied that he did not have any with him he was shot dead, along with disk jockey Jeff "Free I" Dixon. The leader was Dennis 'Leppo' Lobban, a man whom Peter had befriended and tried to help find work after a long jail sentence. Leppo turned himself over to the authorities, and was tried and convicted in the shortest jury deliberation in Jamaican history: eleven minutes. He was sentenced to death, but his sentence was commuted in 1995 and he remains in prison. Neither of his two alleged accomplices were found, though rumors persist that both were gunned down in the streets.

Legalize It:

365. Fela Kuti And The Africa '70 - Zombie (1976)

















Track Listing

1. Zombie
2. Mister Follow Follow

Review

This is the second Fela Kuti album on the list and it is, if possible even better than the previous one. Well, it is basically composed of two songs, but that is no demerit. It is quite a short album, but so is the Ramones one. Of the two songs Zombie is by far superior and it is one of the most infectious tracks ever to have left the African continent. A great track with a message, this anti-militaristic anthem will really make you move... Bob Dylan it ain't.

It is a pity that I knew nothing of Fela Kuti before doing this project, now I am really glad I do know him. Kuti, has energy, humour and a brilliant musical mind. The two tracks, even if one is superior are as close to flawless as you can get. They are not just great fun, or great political tracks, they are also expertly played and composed.

And how rare is it to have an album that actually made a difference in people's lives? The popularity of this album in Nigeria led to a backlash against the military, leading the military to raze Kuti's compound and throw his mother out the window, which led to her death. This is how powerful the music is.

Track Highlights

1. Zombie
2. Mister Follow Follow

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

In 1977 Fela and the Afrika 70 released the hit album Zombie, a scathing attack on Nigerian soldiers using the "zombie" metaphor to describe the methods of the Nigerian military. The album was a smash hit with the people and infuriated the government, setting off a vicious attack against the Kalakuta Republic, during which one thousand soldiers attacked the commune. Fela was severely beaten, and his elderly mother was thrown from a window, causing fatal injuries. The Kalakuta Republic was burned, and Fela's studio, instruments, and master tapes were destroyed. Fela claimed that he would have been killed if it were not for the intervention of a commanding officer as he was being beaten. Fela's response to the attack was to deliver his mother's coffin to the main army barrack in Lagos and write two songs, "Coffin for Head of State" and "Unknown Soldier," referencing the official inquiry which claimed the commune had been destroyed by an unknown soldier.

A guy breakdancing to the instrumental bit of Zombie:

364. Ramones - Ramones (1976)
















Track Listing

1. Blitzkrieg Bop
2. Beat On The Brat
3. Judy Is A Punk
4. I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend
5. Chainsaw
6. Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue
7. I Don't Wanna Go Down In The Basement
8. Loud Mouth
9. Havana Affair
10. Listen To My Heart
11. 53rd And 3rd
12. Let's Dance
13. I Don't Wanna Walk Around With You
14. Today Your Love Tomorrow The World

Review

Hey, ho, let's go! That is the sound of Punk starting! We have been charting the beginnings of punk from The Monks back in the mid-60's, now, more than 10 years later we have the actual thing. This is the first universally recognised Punk album and it is a welcome change.

I am not that big a fan of the Ramones, but this album is pretty great. It takes a little bit to get used to it, at the beginning all the songs seem pretty much the same, but you soon start to make them out as individual pieces.

Another interesting thing here is to see where the Ramones are coming from, it isn't just the obvious Iggy Pop and New York Dolls, there is plenty here from Doo-Wop and 50's rock which they were clearly fascinated with. Of course punk is a reaction to some of the crappy music we've been having, but it is a necessary revolution, and even tough I am much more of a fan of proto and post-punk we needed something to clean our palate. It is a bit like that pickled ginger you have between sushi pieces, a bit of a reset button bringing rock back to its essentials and doing hard. Essential.

Track Highlights

1. Blitzkrieg Bop
2. Judy Is a Punk
3. 53rd and 3rd
4. Beat On The Brat

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

After Seymour Stein of Sire Records signed the band in the autumn of 1975, the band began to record their debut the following winter. Ramones was recorded quickly and cheaply at Plaza Sound, Radio City Music Hall, New York; recording lasted from February 2 through the 19th, 1976 on a budget of only $6,200. The template of guitar and bass in opposite channels with the drums in the middle was based on early Beatles and Cream records

Many radio disc jockeys were supposedly put off by the records' primitive, frantic music and often bizarre themes and the album did not receive heavy airplay, only peaking at number #111 on the Billboard's (North America) Pop Albums chart upon being released April 23.

Despite this, the Ramones eventually established the reputation as being the godfathers of punk rock, and the album is largely considered a highly influential classic. Its influence on punk and myriad genres of alternative rock cannot be overstated. In 2003 the TV network VH1 named Ramones the 54th greatest album of all time. In 2003, the album was ranked number 33 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

Blitzkrieg Bop: