Album Reviews

I know people who actually think that The Ramones were a “joke” band&#151sort of a punk version of Sha Na Na. I’m not kidding. I know people who thought The Ramones were a sloppy outfit goofing around on stage. I know people who think Joey Ramone was a screamer. But then I live in the suburbs.

Former Kinks frontman Ray Davies’ fans are among the most fan-atic in rock. I found out the hard way when I dared to post a less than fawning review of an Irving Plaza show I attended last spring on a Kinks fan newsgroup that I joined.

Tony Bennett recorded a live album with Count Basie and his orchestra in Philadelphia that was issued in 1959 by Columbia Records (In Person! Tony Bennett, Count Basie and His Orchestra CS 8104 “6 eye”). In 1961 Peggy Lee released a live album on Capitol recorded at Basin Street East in New York City.

After a series of albums that tried too hard to advance the cause and so seemed self-consciously so, Paul Simon has produced his best since Graceland. The album title explains how he's managed. It celebrates the significant but demolishes it at the same time.

Talk Talk is one of those groups that often fall through the cracks of both music history and mainstream consciousness — beloved by some, overlooked by many. Luckily, we have a pair of new half-speed-mastered LPs from their catalog to share a proper (re)assessment. Read on to see Mark Smotroff’s review of the HSM LPs for 1988’s Spirit of Eden and 1984’s It’s My Life, plus find out what AP editor Mike Mettler thinks of the merits of 2025’s The Very Best of Talk Talk 2LP set. . .

Back on Wednesday, April 22, 2026, we here at AP shared our respective Record Store Day 2026 experiences, along with assessments of some of our purchases that day. In that post, we also mentioned that we would be delving into three more RSD 2026 releases at a later time — and that time is now. Read Mark Smotroff’s review (and AP editor Mike Mettler’s footnotes) to see why the RSD 2026 releases from XTC, Buster Williams, and Brian Wilson are all worthy of your attention — albeit for quite different reasons. . .

Lou Reed’s bleak Berlin album dropped with a thud when first released back in 1973. The fans were probably expecting Transformer 2 and a “Walk on the Wild Side” reprise, but Lou was having none of that. He was moving on and down (both chart-wise and thematically) but times eventually catch up to vision and that’s the case with Berlin.