The Diary of a Hobbyist

SCORE: 67/100 Did Dr. Giggletouch produce this?  'Dakloos' isn't the best album by any means - but it does feel like a solid start for Joost. The amateur sound of this album is actually quite endearing as it really shows how he was just starting out.  It feels like an amateur version of the already blasé material found on 2019's 'Albino', but the material here is somewhat more palatable (and shorter) than his more recent trap project. This one has a lot less experimentation, but it still feels a lot more entertaining and enjoyable than a lot of other trap albums. Joost using his native tongue for this album makes this much more listenable than English trap as well.  Compared to other trap projects this does have more backbone to it, but a clear new-to-the-scene sound keeps this album from flourishing, but it does manage to be better than 'Albino' in terms of being much more consistently enjoyable. The quality of this album does actually improve after the...

SCORE: 62/100 How he went from this to making gabber music is entirely beyond me. Joost's 'Albino' isn't a bad album by any means, but it lacks the real flair that makes his newer projects much more memorable. There are some high moments here, but it's clear that electronic suits him much more than rap music does - and when those electronic elements shine through somewhat here, they make for the best moments on the album. It's fun, palatable rap; but it isn't what you might be looking for from a Joost album.  There are some very fun moments here and the beats are good. They have enough texture and a good pace that keeps the album fun, and after a slower opener, the album takes form into something with much more energy. It's a fun project that does what it needs to - but it isn't as interesting artistically as what Joost would go on to do in the later, more recent years of his career. It's hard not to compare the present to the past, but this era ...

SCORE: 90/100 She Wants Revenge utilized synths and deep, throbbing gothic beats to make their self titled debut instantly memorable - with this album being one of, if not my first introduction into goth music after I gained interest in it as a child. Some of the band's most memorable material resides on this record, with songs like 'These Things' and 'I Don't Wanna Fall in Love' being highlights within the band's short discography - this album is their most well known as it spawned the most "hits" from its tracklist. The result in the band's sound is something that feels inspired, yet fresh; with clear influences from other bands helping to bring She Wants Revenge into the right direction, their intentions are clear, and they feel very well executed. The ideas are noted as being somewhat repetitive, but they're done uniquely and differently enough from one another to make the album feel like it goes on well. The songs are somewhat slow - b...

SCORE: 19/100 South Park tried to warn us about the Mormons and NONE OF YOU LISTENED. He somehow managed to make a track worse than 'Beautiful Things' (one of my most hated songs of all time) with 'Mr Electric Blue', and the entire album is... well, what you would expect from a Benson Boone album. He has the energy, that's for certain - but his need for speed and desperate attempts for style don't make up for the poor quality that the album ends up having. It seems like he's really trying; and his image is clearly something he's trying to fine-tune, but if he keeps fine-tuning the image he currently has, he may be doomed to a career full of poor-quality albums that will leave him with an even more infamous legacy. It's never a good sign when an artist is only so well known because one of their songs is so abysmally bad it's become a sheer laughing stock, and this album just carries on what seems like tradition through making bad songs, with poor ...

SCORE: 93/100 Queens of the Stone Age's debut is one I've been meaning to get to for a while now - and the fact that they had their sound down this well for their first album is an impressive feat. It may be slightly rough around the edges; but there's no better introduction to their sound than this one. This was an incredible way for them to present themselves during the earliest roots of their career as a band, and the result is a striking debut that leaves the band off with a long-lasting impression. It's clear that they had their sound polished and where they wanted to go down, and they managed to pull it off very well for a debut. It may not be as polished as some of their later, more renowned work - but this is a striking beginning.  There's a sense of sleaze, a sense of indecency that manages to be muddled through memorable guitar riffs and stoner grooves that make this album feel like a much more in-depth result of the stoner rock genre and its many forms. T...

SCORE: 70/100 Unsurprisingly weak lyrically but solid instrumentally, Weezer's 'Make Believe' is a pretty standard issuing for them, with their traditional sound not really leaving any boundaries; it makes for a project that most fans of the band could enjoy, but there are some weak moments that make this album pale in comparison to their other projects. And are the lyrics really a negative aspect if they're enough to make me laugh? Never. 'Make Believe' is highly inconsistent, and it feels more like a compilation of songs than a well-structured album. It's enjoyable enough, but it lacks the depth that their earlier albums have. There's a huge gap in sound between the tracks, which makes it feel like more of a random selection than a project that has actual backbone put into it - none of the songs go together with one another, and the band simply did way too many things at once for this album to make it a feasible project in terms of structure; but the e...

SCORE: 96/100 'Vapor Transmission' is an album that I've been meaning to get to for a while now, with 'Fiction' becoming one of my absolute definitive, all time favorite songs from any artist or any album of all time. The album cover as well as this one song alone help to set the futuristic, stripped yet noisy soundscape and atmosphere held by this album, with Orgy using a sleek industrial/cyber combination to set the stage for this project and its sound. This album has heavier sounds than I expected with a huge usage of synth lines and various, gritty acts of instrumentation that bring the album above other industrial albums by a longshot. The futuristic, cyber metal sound of 'Vapor Transmission' is even more alluring than I could've expected it to be, and Orgy managed to make themselves one of my favorite bands with this album alone. Orgy managed to make a less extreme sound for industrial rock/metal, with more sleek soundscapes and a focus on a highly...

SCORE: 100/100 Pitchshifter share similarities to other nu-metal and industrial acts while having a flair that makes them unlike anyone else in the rock scene; with their breakbeat-laden sound being similar to The Prodigy in the biggest sense possible. No other band could possibly recreate the high energy madness that instantly ensues on 'www.pitchshifter.com', and I knew I would fall for this album as soon as I read the genres - but I couldn't have anticipated it being THIS good. It's been a long, long time since an album has made me as excited as this one managed to, and the sound of this is truly unbeatable. The eccentric sound with elements of breakbeat and drum and bass being woven in to an industrial record makes this highly captivating and hugely interesting, and the energy here is something that will immediately get your adrenaline up; at least it did for me. It's rare that an album makes me feel giddy with excitement - but this one did that to such a high d...

SCORE: 92/100 Bad Religion share many qualities with other, similar punk bands - but there's no denying that they were the founding fathers in a much larger scale for the skate punk scene. They mix the social politics of the genre with a lighter, more accessible sound with less noise and still enough grit to keep the record rugged around its edges; and the result is yet another album that showcases the band's style incredibly well.  This album sounds like it could be the soundtrack for a skateboarding game from the 90s-2000s (think Tony Hawk & the 'skate.' franchises) , and it does this so well that the energy is almost infectious. The drumming in particular on this album stands out as one of its leading factors, with striking instrumental quality and great, genre-suited vocals to match, the album remains consistent. 'Recipe for Hate' shares a lot of similarities with NOFX - I found the resemblance between the two bands in terms of their sounds to be strikin...

SCORE: 92/100 I've loved Mitski for years upon years now, and yet the thought of listening to her fills me with this sort of harrowing sadness no other artist gives me quite like this. Her music manages to be so heartbreakingly devastating it's hard not to fall in love with her style, and she does it without seeming too overly dramatic or like she is doing too much with her music; it's just right. 'Retired from Sad, New Career in Business' is much less lo-fi than her debut album 'Lush', with her stunning vocals being backed by a 60-piece student based orchestra that gives the project a hugely lively, almost hopeful sound with glimpses of something sweeter between the more gut-wrenching songs.  Mitski used this as her senior project while studying at the State University of NY at Purchase, where she was studying for her music career. She self-released the album and made music videos for every song within it, with each of the songs and their video counterparts...

SCORE: 98/100 Jack Off Jill managed to make themselves known as one of the grittiest, most raw all-female bands out there, and their 2006 compilation of recordings that took place from the early-to-mid 90s showcases their style deliciously well. They feel like more than just Riot Grrrl, feeling unlike any other bands in the genre with their sheer heaviness and their consistently gorgeous and raw style that you can't find from any other band; not like this. They don't try and lean into pop or other popular subgenres or stylings, they make their own rules and play by their very own handbook - one lined in grisly pink and the most raw elements of femininity.  'Humid Teenage Mediocrity' feels like an essential and entirely comprehensive look at JOJ as a band. It showcases their brutal honesty through early, previously unreleased material as well as demo versions of songs that would make their way onto their debut album in 1997. There are some truly stunning moments on this ...

SCORE: 95/100 After 1998's trouble-laden 'Cruelty and the Beast', Cradle of Filth went through upkeep to keep their sound fresh and rejuvinated for the new millennium.  This album is the first project the band worked on with their then-new drummer Adrian Erlandsson, who they worked with until 2006. Actor Doug Bradley was also enlisted for the "cast" of this album, working as the narrator to the loosely-laid concept found throughout 'Midian'.   It follows a very similar structure to what the band is known for, with a symphonic opening piece with a gradual buildup and gorgeous instrumentation (with this actually being one of their most buildup-heavy openings with an organ and some of their best string arrangements yet) that lead into seamless transitions and strikingly fast pieces that use their instruments especially to bring the album up to new highs for the band. It's seemingly even heavier than some of their other albums, and Erlandsson's work wi...

SCORE: 70/100 I think it's a safe bet that only Jack Stauber could pull off music like this. It manages to be so nonsensical while still having form, and the overall sound of the production is full of so much genuine whimsy and playfulness it's hard to turn your nose up at this short soundtrack. The songs are short, making their fun nature more apparent, and it means that nothing overstays its welcome. Vocally, this project isn't that ideal in terms of sound, but the production is creative and fun enough to make this a worthwhile 6-minute project. It's short enough for the vocals to not become too overbearing, but it's solid enough to still be something fun and interesting to listen to; with the uniqueness being the key factor in how the soundtrack comes together. Stauber has pretty much mastered the "weirdcore" sound palate, and although this project is too short to feel fleshed out enough to be a proper listen, the short songs do his style enough justice...

SCORE: 100/100 Deep Shadows is an album I knew I was wrong about from the moment I posted my review. I went into HIM's third album expecting the heavier sounds of the band to be ever-present on this LP as well - but when I was met with a different sound with more experimentation and ballad-fronted tracks, I was caught off guard. I still gave it an overwhelming amount of praise in my original review, but I knew it was more than a 97. It felt like something I might not have come back to as much, as if the songs weren't as memorable - but I quickly realized that some of the band's absolute best material resides on this album. From the night I reviewed it I found myself coming back again, and again, and... again. The opening track alone for this album shows how different it is from the rest of their catalogue, with a more experimental sound palate that refines their sound into something even more melodic and atmospheric while keeping the sounds that fans of the band had come to...

SCORE: 100/100 HIM's second and final EP before their debut is even more gritty and striking than their first, with arrangements from their first demo that have been worked upon and tweaked until they would become tracks that would make their way into other albums/versions, '666 Ways to Love: Prologue' feels like an absolute essential piece in HIM's discography for both content and context. The demo versions of these songs are just as good as the more recognized finished versions, with the demo for 'Wicked Game' having a sense of grit that makes it one of their most worthwhile demo tracks. Along with two tracks that would make it onto their debut, this EP contains 'Stigmata Diaboli' and an early version of 'Dark Sekret Love', with both tracks feeling like absolute must-hears for any HIM fan. '666 Ways to Love' is about as good as it gets when it comes to a demo tape. It's an absolute powerhouse showcase of the band's sound while r...

SCORE: 95/100 With his second effort and his rocker image in full swing, Billy Idol managed to come out swinging even harder than ever before with 'Rebel Yell', a gorgeously consistent album with some of his best material to date packaged in one delightful 38 minute set of tracks. Idol had his image down completely by this point in his career - and it shows.  The album's title track is completely infectious, one of the absolute staple pieces in the new wave/rock scene of the early-mid 80s encapsulated with just one song, one act of rebellion that makes Idol stick out so much from the crowd of poppier 80s artists. The album flawlessly mixes synth-filled croons and ballads with heavier, more ambitious and energy-fueled tracks, and the result is an album so packed full of variety and gorgeous concepts it's near impossible to ignore.  'Rebel Yell' does suffer from hit syndrome - with the title track and 'Eyes Without a Face' standing out much more from the r...

SCORE: 73/100 Sorry for my absence! I have been taking time away from working and when I have been working it has been on a much bigger review project... meaning that I haven't had the chance to multitask and juggle album listens at the same time. This one has been in my queue for a while, and it's highly worthwhile for what it is. Melodic and folklore-esque, 'Kill the Sun' is a stunning debut that is highly underlooked in the symphonic metal genre from a band that clearly deserves much more. The slower, more gothic sound to this album is something that not a lot of symphonic metal albums contain, and the band pulls off their style very well - making for a unique and enjoyable album that uses a short and welcoming runtime to make itself much more appealing from a wider scheme.  The issue with 'Kill the Sun' comes from a somewhat lacking sound palate. The sound is good, but it feels very surface level for such a complex and lush genre, making this album pale when...

SCORE: 94/100 A true staple for the band, 'Collide with the Sky' is widely considered and looked at as Pierce The Veil's magnum opus. With riffy guitars, fast drumming, and Vic Fuentes' iconic vocals at the forefront of the constantly refreshing and heavy-hitting 2012 project, 'Collide with the Sky' takes the stellar sounds of the 2000s and expands upon them in a way that far other emo bands could do with this effect. There's a hugely emotional tone to the entirety of this album that ranges from sorrowful to rage-filled at every turn, with a sound that changes between melodic and heavily charged in an instant with a near-constant pace, it's hard to be bored by this project - and the band uses their skillset very wisely for the composition of this album. Pierce the Veil do post-hardcore just about as good as it gets, and the mix of genres like mall screamo, emo, and easycore make this album an absolute essential.  Some of the band's best, most recogni...

SCORE: 97/100 Six albums in has never sounded so strong, and you know an album is going to be good when it wound up in as much controversy as this one did. 'Liebe ist für alle da' manages to be their most disturbing, grisly, danceable project yet - with the synth work on this project feeling even more like something from a violently sexual underground club scene than anything else they have created at this point into their careers.  There's an even stronger, much more disturbing force held by this album - with heavier sounds present within the first track alone and the truly disturbing lyrical content through the infamous second track in particular, 'Liebe ist für alle da' is Rammstein at their hardest, their most violent, their most psychosexual and intense. This album was an incredible way for them to close off before their eventual decade-long hiatus, but they made enough strong material to make their entire discography sound fresh every single time you listen to...

SCORE: 90/100 Fans of My Chemical Romance are sure to love this post-hardcore project featuring Gerard Way - with The Oval Portrait being a hugely mysterious and somewhat cryptic band due to the huge lack of information on them.  The fast paced, loud punk sound of this album is hugely unexpected and delightfully inviting - with short-form tracks (apart from a handful of standard length tracks scattered throughout alongside the two minute tracks) and skillful instrumentation, 'Life in Death' manages to be one of the most immersive punk projects I have heard recently despite it being such a massive oddity; sometimes the best things come from bands no one has ever really heard much about.  'Life in Death' hugely utilizes stellar transitioning between songs and a cohesive sound that makes the entire album flow together in a stunning manner. The songs have enough variety to make them stick out in a lonesome context, but the album comes together so well it's almost imposs...

SCORE: 95/100 Rammstein's debut album packs a heavy punch, thus starting the steady conception process of Neue Deutsche Härte - something no other band would ever be able to pull off; even over three decades later. Although 'Herzeleid' doesn't have the overall polish that they would soon find for their secondcoming, this album is a solidification of their sound from a very early point into their careers - and this album has much more grit than what you get with some of their other work.  This album came with a lot of issues for the band due to the language barriers and change in customs across countries where the group had to work - with the recording of this album taking place in Stockholm, Sweden. Issues arose due to the band not sharing a language that they could speak with the producer, making it increasingly difficult for them to get their ideas across. The confusion of finding a producer due to this not being a common custom in East Germany made the process that m...