Lawrence Welk - Calcutta Review

Great album!  I believe it came out in 1960.  Featuring Frank Scott on the harpsichord.  Solid album all the way through and very listenable.  The quality of the recording is superb for its time and definitely a great instrumental album.  The harpsichord is strong throughout the album and it adds character and strangeness to the record.  The female background singers harmonies and "vocals" adds an eerie but good sound to the entire album.  Beautifully arranged and well written.  Albums like this are a lost art and I am happy to have it in my collection.  I recommend this album to anyone, even if you don't typically like instrumental music.  It has that tropical island, no cares in the world kind of feel to it.  I am looking forward to breaking this one out this summer and sitting outside in the shade with the portable record player and a cold drink.   

Rush - Hold Your Fire Review

I am a huge Rush fan so I will try and write an unbiased review.  Released in 1987 and not a very popular Rush album.  This album is definitely only going to be appreciated by a "Rush Head".  It is more of a soft rock album and not hard rock.  I happen to like the style of Rush on this LP while most would probably wonder why they went this direction.  As Rush is always a constant musically evolving band over the last 40 years, this album proves that theory.  I always joke that this is a shopping album meaning that you could easily hear any song on this album on the overhead speakers at the grocery store and not realize it was Rush.  Rush is way too cool for that though, right?  I like every cut on the record except the last 2 songs, "Tai Shan" and "High Water".  I have never been able to get into them even after 25 years of being a "Rush Head".  The LP overall is great though and I recommend it for anyone's collection as it is truly a Rush stepping stone LP.  Side 1 is the stronger side for sure.

Opus - Up And Down Review

My overall impression after listening to the first 4 tracks is that this band is a mix between Alan Parson's Project, Journey, and Yes.  This is a live album that came out in 1984 or 1985 (there are two copyrights on the back.  Live is Life is the radio song / pop song on the album as the sticker on the front denotes.  The song is kind of a mediocre "audience high"song kind of like Closer To The Heart by Rush.  Nice to get that song out of the way right out of the gate since the rest of the first side gets better as it goes along.  More percussion and synthesizers are slowly introduced with each song building towards the second side of the album to be epic maybe?  Unfortunately not.  It stays flat on side 2 and almost gets worse.  It is kind of 80's Reo Speedwagon style on side 2.  So, you have about 5 out of 10 tracks that are decent and worth listening to.  A plus is that this is a completely live album but it doesn't sound like it.  The production quality is excellent.  It unfortunately doesn't say where or when this album was recorded live. Not a bad album overall and definitely worth giving a listen to.  Something different but not really.

Intro

Welcome to my newest blog. I have a big collection of vinyl, about 425 Lps. I have decided to do a blog about the albums I have. The blog is going to be mostly reviews of albums. Everything will be reviewed from the artwork to the production quality. I don't think for this blog I am going to have a rating system like I do with my video game reviews. I am just going to talk about the album and wether I like it or not. Keep checking back as I will post when I get the chance.