Colossal Reviews

Only Unbiased Product Reviews

Colossal Reviews > hard rock > Page 2

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere by Neil Young with Crazy Horse (Vinyl record album review)

By 1 Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere
  • Artist name: Neil Young
  • Group name: Crazy Horse
  • Year: 1969
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Reprise Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Distinguishing characteristics: each of my parents had a copy of this record. My father’s had a “G” on the upper left corner of the front of the album, and my mother’s had “Brenner” written on the inside of the album and on side one of the LP.
  • Buy it on Amazon: $20.85

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere by Neil Young with Crazy Horse

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’ve listened to this record at least a bunch of times, and recognize all or most of the songs on it, but I don’t remember ever hearing it when I was growing up, with the exception of Cinnamon Girl, which was played very occasionally on classic rock radio.

This is the ninth Neil Young record that I’m reviewing, and the previous eight were:

What I expected

Electric Neil Young.

What it was actually like

I think I remember now why I haven’t listened to this record as much as others by Neil Young: it has some of his best songs, but is also pretty uneven – but when it’s good, it’s so, so good.

I could probably listen to Cinnamon Girl, Down by the River and Cowgirl in the Sand a hundred times in a row on repeat. The very distorted electric guitar, and the long and virtuosic solos with the same note played over and over[1], are really powerful, all the more so in the context of much of his other work from the few years before and after, which was largely acoustic. He could be singing pure gibberish and it would make no difference, and parts reminded me of the Dead Man soundtrack.

Round & Round (It Won’t Be Long), which was more acoustic and boring, made me think that maybe it was why I haven’t listened very much – not to pick on it, though, because the rest of the songs were similar.

Grade

4/5: would listen again

References

References
↑1 How does this even work, musically?

Climbing! by Mountain (Vinyl record album review)

By Leave a Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: Climbing!
  • Group name: Mountain
  • Year: 1970
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Windfall Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Distinguishing characteristics: “G” written on top left of album, indicating that my father owned it
  • Buy it on Amazon: $43.46

Climbing! by Mountain

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I have no familiarity at all with Mountain (the band) or with Climbing! (the record), though I have some familiarity with mountains and with climbing, and also with mountain climbing.

What I expected

I could not easily tell what this was about at first, because the album just makes it look like “Mountain Climbing!”. But my father was able to figure it out, and he also mentioned that he really liked the song Theme for an Imaginary Western, after I read him the track list so he could remember its name.

The back of the album says, “THIS RECORD WAS MADE TO BE PLAYED LOUD” and it’s from 1970, so my guess is hard rock.

What it was actually like

This did turn out to be hard rock and was even a bit proto-metal and, coming off yesterday’s review of Idea by the Bee Gees, I really should have loved it, but it was surprisingly boring. I did think that it was definitely somewhat innovative for 1970, but by that year Led Zeppelin had already released three LPs, so this was not altogether entirely impressive.

The first side was much less interesting to me than the second. It had lots of guitar riffs and a bunch of that metal “crunch,” but not much else.

On the second side, To My Friend was an acoustic instrumental with just guitar that sounded like sitar, which was very cool.

For Yasgur’s Farm was also more fun and rhythmic, with a lot more going on, including a great bass line.

I thought that Sittin’ on a Rainbow was the record’s best song, with the most catchy guitar riff and the best balance of cowbell, gritty and slightly shouty vocals, and badass drumming.

Boys in the Band also impressed for its otherworldly guitar solos, but the rest of the song was not that good.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

Moby Grape (1967) (Vinyl record album review)

By Leave a Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: Moby Grape
  • Group name: Moby Grape
  • Year: 1967
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Columbia Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Distinguishing characteristics: “GESSNER” written inside album cover and on LP, indicating that my father owned it
  • Buy it on Amazon: $145.00

Moby Grape (1967)

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I have no recollection of ever hearing the name “Moby Grape” before, but my father groaned when I said that I would be listening to it, described it as “60s hard rock,” and said that I might recognize some of the songs.

What I expected

1967 seems like it might have been slightly early for 60s hard rock, but not that early: this record was released a couple of days after the famous Jimi Hendrix hard rock rendition of Sgt. Pepper in London. So I’ll guess some psychedelic rock and some hard rock.

What it was actually like

This was a really interesting record because I definitely liked it and thought it was very good, but no songs really stood out.

They were clearly great at writing and recording parts of songs – guitar parts, intros, bridges, riffs, vocals, solos, bass lines – but I’m utterly baffled at how un-catchy these songs all were. That said, most of the songs were lively, trippy, and kind of reminded me of the MC5, with a strong proto-punk sound (that would only have made sense in the context of punk coalescing after a decade).

Was it hard rock? Not by Hendrix standards or Led Zeppelin standards, but it was definitely a lot harder than most of the music from that part of the 1960s.

The fastest and most punk-like song was Omaha, but others were also quite up tempo, like Come in the Morning.

My favorite was Ain’t No Use, which almost had a bluegrass sound, except done with rock instruments (as far as I could hear), which was very cool.

There were no bad songs, but Someday was less electric and sounded kind of confused, and Naked, If I Want To was less than a minute long and sounded kind of pointless, as if they came up with a bit of an idea for a song but were not quite able to work it into a whole song.

One thing that really stood out to me from watching the Beatles’ Get Back documentary was the extent to which they would keep messing with their material over and over and over again, and still leave it off the record if they didn’t quite feel like it belonged. Maybe Moby Grape would have benefited from that sort of approach.

Grade

4/5: would listen again

Tracks by McKendree Spring (Vinyl record album review)

By Leave a Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: Tracks
  • Group name: McKendree Spring
  • Year: 1972
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Decca Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Distinguishing characteristics: “G” written inside album cover, indicating that my father owned it
  • Buy it on Amazon: $29.99

Tracks by McKendree Spring

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I thought that I might have heard of McKendree Spring, but I couldn’t be sure, and mentioned this record to my parents. My father said that their music was very lively and pleasant, and that they were one of the first groups to use an electric violin. Then I checked, and realized that I actually had reviewed Second Thoughts (1970) less than five weeks ago – and liked it[1]! Ooops!

What I expected

Folk, folk rock, electric country.

What it was actually like

Most of the songs on this record were basically country rock, and they sounded fine, but I didn’t find them special or interesting for the most part. Shoot Me was more of a hard rock song, but still country rock at its core.

The Man In Me is definitely not one of my favorite Bob Dylan songs, but McKendree Spring’s version was very strong, much richer than his and without his annoying voice.

I also thought that Watch Those Pennies was great, even though it was quite Oompa Loompa and sounded kind of like a 1920s dance hall tune. It was quite entertaining, and I loved its electric violin.

Probably my favorite was Friends Die Easy II, with an electric guitar that sounded like Santana.

Two Of Me had an interesting sound like on Second Thoughts with very extensive violin, but I disliked it overall because it sounded atonal, and Train To Dixie had an appalling saxophone solo.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

References

References
↑1 I credited a lot of the interesting sound on Second Thoughts to a synthesizer, but now I suspect that I was actually describing their electric violin! Ooops!

Bustin’ Out by Pure Prairie League (Vinyl record album review)

By Leave a Comment

Record basics

  • Album name: Bustin’ Out
  • Group name: Pure Prairie League
  • Year: 1972
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: RCA Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Who owned it: My mother said that she owned this, but when I replied that it looked like the kind of thing my father would have owned, they both said that either of them might have owned it.
  • Buy it on Amazon: $24.99

Bustin' Out by Pure Prairie League

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I have no familiarity at all with Pure Prairie League, but the album cover reminds me of Happy Trails by Quicksilver Messenger Service. My parents said that Falling In and Out of Love and Amie were popular and that I might recognize them.

What I expected

My mother said that this would not fit any genre description, and my father described it as “light rock.” My guess would have been country rock.

What it was actually like

I don’t know about light rock, but there were parts of this record that I would have classified as soft rock, or folk rock: Angel and Call Me, Tell Me.

The predominant sound, however, was country rock, which was clear from the opening bars of Jazzman, with its steel guitar and country style vocals. Boulder Skies and Angel #9 were like that too, and I liked the latter’s guitar solo. Early Morning Riser was also a country rock with a strong guitar solo, and its up tempo drumming was great.

I definitely did recognize Amie, though I guess I had previously assumed that it was an Allman Brothers song. Ooops! It sounded like it fit together pretty neatly with Leave My Heart Alone, which preceded it, and it was a high point of the record, especially its memorable chorus (here is a cover, and here is another cover).

Leave My Heart Alone was the weirdest song on the record, someone packing a little bit of about ten musical styles into less than four and a half minutes – it was a hard rock song with folk rock vocals, soul backing vocals, funk guitar, a blues guitar riff, and more!

Grade

4/5: would listen again