402. Fela Kuti and Africa 70, "Expensive Shit"

 


I feel really awful about this but I didn't like it!  Let's unpack for a second.  First, not liking something is fine, right?  Maybe I'm just not that musically sophisticated to appreciate whatever genre this is, and it is worlds apart from what I usually listen to, for sure.  There are only two songs for a total of 24 minutes and they're more like jazz than actual "songs" and I don't know, it's just not my thing!

The second thing to unpack is why do I feel awful about it?  Why would I feel bad about not liking something?  Okay, hand to God, I don't feel that awful, but I do feel sort of provincial and small-minded in not being able to get out of my comfort zone and really make an effort with what just might be the 402nd best album ever made.  

I think there are two things going on.  First, this album is obviously beloved to a lot of people who know a lot about music so I don't want to appear dumb by saying DURRRRRRR I NO LIKE because it's not power pop or whatever.  It's a classic thing where sometimes critics all fall in line behind something just because no one wants to be the one person saying "this blows" and then everyone else sneering "this dumbass doesn't know anything about art."  Second, the new Rolling Stone list is obviously an effort to include more marginalized voices and not just be White Guys who are Friends with Jann Wenner like past years lists tended to be, and I don't want to bring that worthy pursuit down.  Not like anyone is listening to me, but still.

So, with conflicted feelings, I must say I did not like this.  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

103. De La Soul, "Three Feet High And Rising"

Image
  Sorry for the service interruption!  Monday I had, like, work stuff to do and yesterday I was picking my wife up at the airport and they lost her bag and we had to file a claim about that and by the time I got home it was well into my Work Hours and you know, I'm just sorry.  (This was tail end of quite a journey for my wife that found her taking off in Ireland and landing in Newark, New Jersey, and then sitting in a plane for almost three hours and then the flight just getting cancelled and then staying in the Courtyard by Marriott in downtown Newark, NJ [not recommended, she says] and then getting on a flight to SFO at 6:30 am and finally getting back here a solid 14 hours later than expected.) Speaking of the greater New York City metropolitan area, a group of kids from Amityville, Long Island, got together in 1988 and started making songs and released this album, one of the best in hip hop or any other genre, in 1989.  De La have been called the "Beatles of hip hop"
Read more

3. Joni Mitchell, "Blue"

Image
  Do you want the good news or the meh news first?  The good news is that this album is better than the other Joni Mitchell albums we've seen , or at least better for me.  I hated one of them and barely tolerated the other, so I was not expecting to like this, and after three listens yesterday, it was not as bad as I'd feared it would be.  The meh news?  I still don't love Joni Mitchell and I don't particularly like this album. Obviously, since it's the number 3 out of the Top 500 albums ever made, a lot of people feel differently.  Pitchfork called it "possibly the most gutting break-up album ever made," which may be true, who knows, but if it is it's about breaking up with a whole series of dudes, from Graham Nash to James Taylor to some guy named Carey.  (In Pitchfork's estimation, this is the 86th best album of the 1970s, so not exactly in number 3 overall territory). One thing that bugs me is Joni Mitchell's voice, which I find kind of g
Read more

1. Marvin Gaye, "What’s Going On"

Image
  500 albums later and we're out of albums.  This album was number 6 on the last iteration of the Rolling Stone list and has now moved up to number 1 (displacing Sgt. Pepper , which was the last album to hold that spot).  I think it's a lovely album with maybe three absolutely incredible songs, a fair amount of average-to-good, and some not great songs.  I'm not a voter and will never be a voter but I just don't think this is the best album of all time. In fact, I would be perfectly fine with this list if they just sawed off the top 3 and left the rest as is: 1. Stevie Wonder, Songs in the Key of Life 2. Beatles, Abbey Road 3. Nirvana, Nevermind 4. Fleetwood Mac, Rumours And so forth.  But let's take this album on its own merits. The first of the three absolute bangers is the title track, "What's Going On," the scene-setter for the rest of the album, a loose concept album that's told from the point of view of a Vietnam vet returning to a country th
Read more