The imagery in "a hard rain" is insane

The melody on don't think twice was my favorite my first go around with the album

I heard the sound of a thunder, it roared out a warnin’
Heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world
Heard one hundred drummers whose hands were a-blazin’
Heard ten thousand whisperin’ and nobody listenin’
Heard one person starve, I heard many people laughin’
Heard the song of a poet who died in the gutter
Heard the sound of a clown who cried in the alley

@elric

This and Giant Steps is such a crazy 1-2 punch

And it's a hard

Bob Dylan - The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (63)

I said it earlier itt, but this is actually the first album I started this whole series with. But I decided to go 10 years back so I wouldn't miss some of the jazz classics. I finally made my way back to it.

First go around with this album, it took me a couple of listens for it to really hit me. But once it clicked it clicked. I try a few Bob dylan songs (don't remember which) over the years but couldn't get past his voice. Which is a common critique for him. The same applied for this album earlier on. A lot of folk singers tend to have great vocals to compensate for the minimal instrumentation on it. But like I said earlier, when it clicks it clicks. His voice aside, the album is comprised mostly of all original compositions. Which hasn't been typical for most vocal albums so far, so that's a pretty cool aspect of it. But the best part of it, is that the writing on here is literally top tier.

The mix of social commentary, vivid imagery, sarcasm, and emotive writing really results in something special here. You can clearly see this with the opening song Blowin In Wind, a song where Dylan is just asking questions and reiterates throughout the song he himself doesn't know the answers but the answers are somewhere in the wind. The song isn't all the complex, it's pretty simple but also very profound at the same time. There's plenty of moments like that on here that really draw the listeners in. Another one is "A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall". The imagery in EVERY line is insanely vivid, he really paints a picture with this one. This can be attribute to the motifs in the song, where the "blue eyed son" has been, heard, seen and met in his travels. And from those travels what the son plans on doing. Just from a writing standpoint the song is beautiful.

Writing aside, the instrumentation on the songs is minimal, as expected from a folk album. This doesn't really take away anything from the enjoyment of the album tho, it honestly enhances it for certain songs. Sometimes the guitar and harmonica is really all it needs. But even with that, there's some beautiful melodies on here. Don't think twice is like ear candy, corrina corrina is blissful, master of wars is powerful. Circling back to his vocals. He may not be the best technical singer but he's a pretty great vocalists once it clicks. I don't know how to describe it but his voice has this very raw and rugged feeling to it that really gives his song this sense of "realness", which ties the whole album together.

There's a lot that can be covered with this album, that's probably been covered a million times already so I'll cut it here. But pretty amazing introduction to dylan

Favorite Tracks: Don't Think Twice. A Hard Rain
Least Favorite Tracks: Honey Just Allow Me One More Chance

The hard panning on stereo is distracting lol

The way some people talk about their albums before rubber soul. Thought this was gonna be a lot worse. It's pretty solid

The Beatles - Please Please Me (63)

With this being the first album I heard from the Beatles I didn't really have any expectations. I said earlier itt, usually when I see discourse over the beatles it just revolves around their albums rubber soul and afterwards. Their earlier albums aren't talk about nearly as much. Overall this album is a nice mix of more hard energetic songs but also quite a bit of more melodic and smooth songs. One of the best aspects of this album for me was the harmonies done , Ask Me Why and Baby It's you comes to mind. Although another highlight of the album was Twist and Shout, which is a just great fun record and idk who vocals it was (I think Lennon) but they were great and brought another level of energy to the track. Solid album and introduction to the beatles.

Favorite Tracks: Baby Its You. Twist And Shout
Least Favorite Tracks: Do You Want To Know A Secret

what about misery and a taste of honey?

Misery definitely top 3. Taste of honey was good too

Dexter Gordon - Our Man In Paris (63)

This is my second Dexter Gordon album after Go. And this album is pretty similar to that album on a lot of fronts. It does exactly what Go does in terms of making a solid traditional hard bop album.

There's really nothing to complain about with this one. But if I were to, I would say this one lack some of the catchiness that GO did. Similar to the last one, the solos are all amazing throughout the whole project, most notable with the song Broadway.

The song that did catch my attention the most from this album is definitely Stairway To The Stars. A nice cool jazz song such as this always hits the spot. And the sax playing from Dexter Gordon invokes this feeling of nostalgia

Overall another very solid album from Dexter Gordon

Favorite Tracks: Stairway To The Stars, Broadway
Least Favorite Tracks: A Night in Tunisia

Lonely Sea

The Beach Boys - Surfin' U.S.A (63)

I heard a lot of the early beach boy albums were surf rock albums and more or less wasn't interested in hearing them. But decide why not just for the experience. Not really much to write about this one. It's very much lived up to the name of the album and the name of their group. It's going to be interesting to see their evolution from this to their future albums. Lonely Sea was a surprising song from the bunch, thats an actual great song that kinda departs from the tone of the rest of the album. If thats any sign of whats to come, then im intrigued. But overall nothing really bad but aside from a few songs, nothing really great, just average. Most notable quality of the album was the harmonizing which was great throughout.

Favorite Tracks: Lonely Sea, Farmer's Daughter
Least Favorite Tracks: Shut Down

The Beatles - With The Beatles (63)

This album has a similar feel to their debut, a tad bit longer and a lil more energetic. But overall very similar to Please Please Please. I think it retains some of the same qualities, fun lightheart songs. However, I so think their debut was stronger and just had more memorable songs and highlights. This album kinda drags on and feels much longer than the debut despite only being a minute longer. It seems like theyre still getting used to their group dynamics. There are still great moments on here like the intro It Won't Be Long, Mister Postman, Till There Was You.

Favorite Tracks: It Wont Be Long, Mister Postman, Till There Was You
Least Favorite Tracks: I Wanna Be Your Man

John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman - John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman (63)

This album has a similar feel to their debut, a tad bit longer and a lil more energetic. But overall very similar to Please Please Please. I think it retains some of the same qualities, fun lightheart songs. However, I so think their debut was stronger and just had more memorable songs and highlights. This album kinda drags on and feels much longer than the debut despite only being a minute longer. It seems like theyre still getting used to their group dynamics. There are still great moments on here like the intro It Won't Be Long, Mister Postman, Till There Was You.

Favorite Tracks: It Wont Be Long, Mister Postman, Till There Was You
Least Favorite Tracks: I Wanna Be Your Man

Are you ready for star time

Great thread