West Texas Heaven - Kimmie Rhodes

Advantages: Beautiful Lyrics, Pure Unadulterated Sound, Perfect Songs
Disadvantages: Sometimes Annoying Purposeful Background Hiss

...Although seemingly a full band from the name, The Mountain Goats for most of their tracks, and this whole album, consist of one single genius - John Darnielle. It is Darnielle's striking nasal voice and frantic acoustic guitar strumming that characterises the Mountain Goats sound, and it is him that the large underground following pay their homage to. For the first part of his musical career, from about 1991, Darnielle recorded himself and his guitar on a cheap boom box, and released albums on cassette only for the shrimper label. The cassette hiss present on these early offerings has turned into somewhat of a must for Darnielle now and is still present on newer records. Having moved on slightly to the time of All Hail West Texas, 2002, and now featuring in the lists and books of Emperor Jones Records, The Mountain Goats retain all... Read review

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Advantages: As refreshing as the first album
Disadvantages: Unmemorable in comparison to "College Dropout"

...The 2005 release "Late Registration" is the second album from the producer and rapper from Chicago, Kanye West. It follows on from the massively successful "College Dropout" which was an unexpected success from a newcomer, only famous on the Hip Hop circuit as a producer at the time. Here Kanye had to come with something huge in order to top to popularity of his debut album, which was able to cross genre boundaries as a refreshing sound in Hip Hop, taking you away from the Gangsta Rap which dominated the style. 1. "Wake Up Mr. West" (Intro) 2. "Heard 'Em Say" Maroon 5's Adam Levine provides his soft vocals to this track in the way which only he can here, offering something quite unexpected of Ye at the time. Many don't acknowledge the depth of his lyrics here, and I haven't a clue why because they are powerful in how he... Read review

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Advantages: It's SRV!
Disadvantages: Minor thing with the album sleeve, hardly worth mentioning!

...Stevie Ray Vaughan (or SRV as he is often known) was an Austin guitarists/singer/songwriter, releasing only five studio albums before his life was untimely ended in a helicopter crash. With his unique guitar tone and individual style, Stevie is still considered one of the greatest rock-blues guitarist of all time, inspiring young players to this day. Eventually going on to appear on albums for the likes of Davie Bowie and Jackson Browne, 'Texas Flood' was his and his band Double Trouble, (Chris Layton on drums and Tommy Shannon on bass) debut album. Originally released in 1983, here we have a remastered version released in 1999, with some Bonus Tracks thrown in for good measure. A mixture of originals and covers, 'Texas Flood' demonstrated SRV's technical abilities and soulful playing. With both upbeat songs, such as 'Pride... Read review

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