Originally posted by BContrat: Hold Steady overrated at 15th or so place? Give me a break.
Obviously, the most overrated album is Ali Farka Toure's boring masterpiece, "Savane". I paid $2 for the only two tracks I liked off the album (actually the first and second 'songs' if you can call them that). I really don't have a frame of reference other than Kongotronics, which was completely different than Savane (and much better in my opinion). How many people actually enjoy listening to this album??
Oh, and I know I'm late on this call, but I think "Z" is fantastically overrated. For some reason, I liked this album in 2005 (#12 on tha LIST) but I can't even stand it anymore. What's more, I have two copies of this album at home, and I'm not quite sure why. I guess I bought it twice. I have to say that "It Still Moves" is much better, and other than "Gideon", "Z" sounds like a band of old guys (not necessarily bad) having lots of fun (good) and screaming randomly (not always good) at the expense of good songs (not good).
maybe you should buy at least the track four of "savane" I think it's a great album and great music. it takes a little bit to understand, the time it takes to get into the blues and other people culture. of course it's a klind of crossover that means nothing to the indie world. I agree about Z
There's only one wildly overrated imo: - Joanna Newsom, Ys With such praise, I've tried to find the appeal in this one, but I'd rather listen to 50 minutes of fingernails scraping across a chalk board. Meandering, unmelodic, barely structured quasi chamber music with abysmally silly "poetry" that might as well have benn written by some junior high student in "Medieval Fantasy Poetry Workshop for Pretentious Maladjusted Twits." Is it highly rated because it's unique? Yes, it is an accomplishment of some sort to produce anything unique at this point in musical history, but I can't find 30 seconds of enjoyment in this simpering twaddle. It's the aural equivalent of a Care Bear fantasy painting on the side of a van driven by a retarded squirrel cruising for nuts through Candyland. End rant. I could be wrong. But "Nooo!" I can't subject my ears and brain to "Ys" again.
For me, besides "Get Lonely" which I have already discussed, it would have to be "Return to Cookie Mountain". The album is OK, but not one of the best albums of the year, yes it does have a few great tracks ("Wolf Like Me", "Blues from Down Here"), but two tracks don't make an album. Cookie Mountain was especially disappointing after the stellar "Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes" which showcased some amazing vocal work and Jazz-Funk beats.
I never hated any of you/I loved you all at the time
Posts: 534 | Location: Sweden | Registered: 27 September 2006
Originally posted by DrAwesome: "Return to Cookie Mountain". The album is OK, but not one of the best albums of the year, yes it does have a few great tracks ("Wolf Like Me", "Blues from Down Here"), but two tracks don't make an album. Cookie Mountain was especially disappointing after the stellar "Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes" which showcased some amazing vocal work and Jazz-Funk beats.
Finally! I totally agree with you. Everyone is saying how amazing the vocals are on their 2006 album but on Babes they are so much better. And what happen to the use of saxophones (some cool baritone stuff) and jazz/funk?
----- I go to sleep and think you're next to me.
Posts: 5752 | Location: Texas | Registered: 27 December 2005
Re TVOTR: maybe it's an either/or thing. I love RTCM but thought 'Babes' was plain dull. On the other hand, in my book, jazz/funk is easily one of my least favourite musical forms. Thank god TVOTR dropped it (and the eighties production elements) for the supreme sci-fi doo wop heard on RTCM.
Trust in God but remember to tie up your camel
Posts: 145 | Location: Sydney, Australia | Registered: 07 January 2007
Re Joanna Newsome's Ys: the backlash on this one is inevitable - it certainly is precious and pretentious. I also happen to feel it is a work of genius that will return to my ears many times in the years to come. It is so passionate and unhinged - coming deep from within a childhood fever dream. Novelty has nothing to do with it (though welcome) - it is the freedom of thought and feeling it gives so generously.
Most Overrated: Hold Steady's latest (an eighties bar band by any other name - who cares if they are more literate than the average?), Clipse's latest (crack-hop genius appeal = my arse), and I agree re 'Z' - what an utter snore of washed out 70s classic stoner rock retread.
Trust in God but remember to tie up your camel
Posts: 145 | Location: Sydney, Australia | Registered: 07 January 2007
Originally posted by DrAwesome: "Return to Cookie Mountain". The album is OK, but not one of the best albums of the year, yes it does have a few great tracks ("Wolf Like Me", "Blues from Down Here"), but two tracks don't make an album. Cookie Mountain was especially disappointing after the stellar "Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes" which showcased some amazing vocal work and Jazz-Funk beats.
Finally! I totally agree with you. Everyone is saying how amazing the vocals are on their 2006 album but on Babes they are so much better. And what happen to the use of saxophones (some cool baritone stuff) and jazz/funk?
I was listening to DYaBTB this weekend, and maybe I'm crazy, but in retrospect I don't find it all that dissimilar from RtCM. The production is a little fuller on the latter, and they're using an actual drummer as opposed to a drum machine, but from a songwriting standpoint, both albums are pretty similar. I think both albums have about the same great song-to-stinker ratio.
----- Stay gold, Ponyboy. Stay gold.
Posts: 5263 | Location: Michigan | Registered: 19 June 2005
i wa slooking down through the current list and i don't really see anything (imo) that is overrated. maybe a few, by a point or two, but as of a whole i really like the method on how they gather up the scores.
i guess if i had to give one overrated cd of the year would be kevin federline. lol.
they gave it a 15? they must have known his mother or something for him to get that much.
Posts: 211 | Location: GA | Registered: 08 January 2007
I was listening to DYaBTB this weekend, and maybe I'm crazy, but in retrospect I don't find it all that dissimilar from RtCM. The production is a little fuller on the latter, and they're using an actual drummer as opposed to a drum machine, but from a songwriting standpoint, both albums are pretty similar. I think both albums have about the same great song-to-stinker ratio.
You know initially I was in love with it because it was "bursting with fresh ideas" (as I am with most of the wierder music eg animal collective. But once I got over that it sounded dull, then after repeated, repeated listens I absorbed it into my consciousness, sounding denser and fuller, and i love it as much as before.
This also occured with albums like "Illinoise", on a line graph it would go up down up, compared to "Yankee hotel foxtrot" or "loveless" or "kid" where its just a gradually increasing line.
The head of state has called for me, but I don't have time for him
Posts: 255 | Location: Sydney, Australia | Registered: 07 September 2006
Also: TV on the Radio. I really dug the album but it was overly praised. Definatly not album of the year quality. I love the textures but the voice wears after a few songs
Posts: 56 | Location: sezttle | Registered: 21 December 2006
Posted 11 January 2007 01:52 PM Hide Post The Hold steady I really don't get the hype on this band; but then again I only got about 45 seconds into a sample of tracks.
you defintly need to hear the whole song before you make a conclusion on this band.
45 seconds is nowhere near enough time for a judgment of any band, especially the hold steady.
Posts: 211 | Location: GA | Registered: 08 January 2007
I'll keep it going with TV on the Radio. I still think their crowning achievement was Young Liars EP, and their sound since then has changed, in my opinion, for the worse. I really like the singers voice, and, personally, nothing has beat Satellite or their Mr. Grieves cover. They've since added the "wall of sound" and it just makes their hooks and soul harder to pick out. I'm all for a bit of random yells, or distortion, but unneccesary noise has always kinda ground my gears. (Raveonettes, and now TVoTR) Still, their musically all their, and they still made my Top 50, but I just don't like where they've gone since their debut EP.
Posts: 305 | Location: AVA | Registered: 24 June 2006
outis Slacker Posted 06 January 2007 07:54 AM Hide Post There's only one wildly overrated imo: - Joanna Newsom, Ys With such praise, I've tried to find the appeal in this one, but I'd rather listen to 50 minutes of fingernails scraping across a chalk board. Meandering, unmelodic, barely structured quasi chamber music with abysmally silly "poetry" that might as well have benn written by some junior high student in "Medieval Fantasy Poetry Workshop for Pretentious Maladjusted Twits." Is it highly rated because it's unique? Yes, it is an accomplishment of some sort to produce anything unique at this point in musical history, but I can't find 30 seconds of enjoyment in this simpering twaddle. It's the aural equivalent of a Care Bear fantasy painting on the side of a van driven by a retarded squirrel cruising for nuts through Candyland. End rant. I could be wrong. But "Nooo!" I can't subject my ears and brain to "Ys" again.
Wouldn't go this far to slam this record...I like it, but it hardly blows me away.
To me the most overrated aspect of the album isn't Newsom, but the string arrangements doen by Dyke Van Parks (or Park Van Dike or whoever). That kind-of timeless acoustic string feel has been attempted before, to wildly greater success, on 60s classics ASTRAL WEEKS and FOREVER CHANGES. The non-harp strings on Ys don't really knock me out, but I actually like her eccentricities and percusive harp.
Posted 11 January 2007 01:52 PM Hide Post The Hold steady I really don't get the hype on this band; but then again I only got about 45 seconds into a sample of tracks.
you defintly need to hear the whole song before you make a conclusion on this band.
45 seconds is nowhere near enough time for a judgment of any band, especially the hold steady.
Okay; I'll give it another go.
Posts: 56 | Location: sezttle | Registered: 21 December 2006
TV on the Radio is way over-rated. Desperate Youth, Thirsty Babes was way superior to Return to Cookie Mountain,
but...
Arctic Monkeys is actually under-rated.
Deperate Youth definately brilliant, better that Cookie Mountain? Maybe. Doesn't stop the new one being great too. It's not overrated by any streach of the imagination.
As for the Arctic Monkeys, every song on that album's is the same, I don't get the fuss everyone's making. Maybe I'm just not "cool" like all the trendy geezers at the NME.
Posts: 285 | Location: London, UK | Registered: 31 December 2006
I really think "Silent Shout" is overrated, along with "Ys" and TVotR's full-length.
Also, while I initially defended Grizzly Bear's Yellow House on the indie forum, I have since changed my opinion: the album is a bore. The depth of its arrangements are commendable yes, but it puts me to sleep with the same baroque banality that haunts all of Sufjan's worst material (read: nearly all of it).
Metacritic Forums 
I think it's a great album and great music. it takes a little bit to understand, the time it takes to get into the blues and other people culture. of course it's a klind of crossover that means nothing to the indie world. 
