CD Odyssey: The Road to 1,100

I’ve reached another (albeit lesser) milestone with 1,100 reviews written so it is time to check in and see what was notable over the past 100 reviews.

I’ve been doing a lot of “new (to me)” reviews under Rule #5 and because a lot of those new (to me) albums are new to the world there is a slight skew toward newly released music of late. 39% of the last 100 albums reviewed were from 2010-2017, compared to just 13% overall. 20% of the last 100 were from 2016 or 2017 only. I expect those numbers to all climb as a) less and less albums remain in my back catalogue and b) I buy more and more new music.

There were 11 5-star albums in the past 100, which is about even for the entire Odyssey overall. Here are the eleven albums that scored the full 5-stars from Discs 1001-1,100:

·         Paul Ngozi – The Ghetto

·         The Pogues – Rum, Sodomy and the Lash

·         Jason Isbell – The Nashville Sound

·         Indigo Girls – Rites of Passage

·         Josh Ritter – The Animal Years

·         Mandolin Orange – Blindfaller

·         Eminem – The Marshall Mathers LP

·         Conor Oberst – Ruminations

·         Frank Turner – Tape Deck Heart

·         Courtney Marie Andrews –Honest Life

·         Rush – Moving Pictures

These albums represent folk, country, rock and rap which is proof-positive that people who listen to only one kind of music are just limiting themselves.

Three were no 1-star reviews of late (which is too bad, because they are fun reviews to write) but I did give 15 albums only 2-stars. Eight of those (plus one 3-star album) got sold or given away to friends. Here’s the full list of albums that were dismissed from the collection out of the last 100:

• Hard Working Americans, “Rest in Chaos” – I had originally planned to buy this album then gave it a second listen and took it off my “to get” list. Then I saw it in the store and in a moment of weakness bought it anyway. Mistake.
• Seasick Steve, “You Can’t Teach an Old Dog New Tricks” – An OK record by the blues master, but I just have better ones I’ll always pick first.
• U2 “Boy” – U2 has a small number of great records and a whole ton of average ones. This is one of the latter.
• Tami Nielsen “Don’t Be Afraid” – Not even a great live show could save Nielsen’s underwhelming latest album, but I’d go see her again.
• John Prine “The Missing Years” – I binged on Prine’s back catalogue last year, and this was the inevitable purge.
• Daniel Romano, “Modern Pressure” – I came close to keeping this one but again, I just have a lot better options in the Daniel Romano section of my collection.
• The Wooden Sky, “Swimming in Strange Waters” – Another close one. I love everything else these guys have done and this one just suffered by comparison more than anything.
• Hawksley Workman, “The Delicious Wolves” – We owned this album for years and never played it. The Odyssey reminded me why.
• Eric Clapton, “461 Ocean Boulevard” – the only 3-star album to leave the collection so I obviously liked it, but I also realized there was nothing on it I couldn’t live without.

In terms of overall reviews, little changed other than Alice Cooper increasing his overall lead. I’ve now reviewed 28 albums by him, which is all of them at this point. Steve Earle stays in second place with 19 albums. The only change is that Tom Waits added a review and is once again tied with Bob Dylan with 18 albums.

Thanks for reading!