eehhh

this is the type of album buy in your early 20s because you are insecure and feel this validates your isolation in some way, plus it is weird and you think you can impress girls with it then you clear it off your iPod by the time you are 30 because it is a piece of crap all along and the girls were right.

Outer space funk classic.

The synthesizers on this album almost make it seem like easy listening 1970s MOR light rock - not quite Christopher Cross territory, because the keyboard squelches and glitches are a little too weird ... more like James Chance playing Bob James-styled smooth jazz with a Kurzweil instead of a saxophone ... and a hefty number of sexual preoccupations. It is, despite the sound of it, not an easy record to listen to. It can be quite disturbing at times precisely BECAUSE it sounds so smooth while the lyrical content is somewhat ... odd. Be sure to download this quickly - there's no telling how long it will be in print or available.

Gary Wilson’s You Think You Really Know Me may be the weirdest album released in 1977; it’s also one of the most influential. The impact of this quirky lo-fi record can never be truly measured. Not many people are aware of it; however, it inspired Beck’s sonic collages and showed college radio stations that home tapings shouldn’t be ignored. Wilson recorded You Think You Really Know Me in his parents’ basement, and it certainly has an intimate feel. On “6.4 = Make Out,” Wilson sounds like he’s whispering in your ear. With a voice reminiscent of Lou Reed’s, Wilson aches like a sexually frustrated Barry White. Porno-movie synthesizers create a sleazy atmosphere as Wilson reaches new heights of emotional intensity when he bellows, “She’s real/She’s so real,” at the track’s end. A person is left wondering if the girl actually exists or if he’s just trying to convince himself that she does. Even more unsettling is “Loneliness,” wherein Wilson confesses in a distorted, psychotic voice, “Sometimes I wish I were dead,” followed by samples of running water and a telephone operator. But this isn’t a gloomy LP. “You Keep on Looking” and “And Then I Kissed Your Lips” utilize chirpy new wave keyboards years before they became fashionable. Wilson is having fun on You Think You Really Know Me, and his enjoyment is infectious, especially when his lunatic personality hogs the spotlight. – Michael Sutton