These two are just as good together as they are separately, love it!
This pairing makes sense; Jessie covered Bobby's 'What You Won't Do for Love' a few years ago. Both versions are well worth checking out.
Wow, what a crushingly disappointing write-up of a wonderful album. The whole “political obligations” thread running through this album’s commentary is just too much. I feel like people are pinning their hopes on one near-novelty track that more invested Kacey fans don’t even particularly like. And ‘Follow Your Arrow’ was track 11 on Same Trailer, Different Park! It’s not exactly her manifesto, her label just wanted it to be. But ‘Follow Your Arrow’ is boring. Its platitudes stick out a bit in country music, sure, but they’re platitudes nonetheless. Country music is built on personal expression, relatable details, and strong songwriting, and Pageant Material is so rich in all of these.
Another thing this album has is country instrumentation. For most people buying this record, that fiddle sound is lot more important, and in the current country climate, subversive, than cutesy platitudes about weed or homosexuality. As a gay man, what I want from Kacey is her unique songwriting perspective and traditional instrumental touch, not her politics. And I don’t see how the title track throws other women under the bus; the song is careful to praise women who can smile when they’re not feeling it. Likewise, to say that ‘Good Ol’ Boys Club’ is a jab at Taylor Swift is a stretch. It’s just as likely a jab at pop-pushing, meddling label head Scott Borchetta.
Sigh. Tl;dr. But I think for fans of country music, this album is thoughtfully, traditionally arranged and displays wide-ranging but relatable sentiments. I’m finding that those who foist their unrealistic expectations and over-analysis onto Kacey Musgraves are tepid on this record, while those who just want great country music are perfectly satisfied.
So far, this is one of those albums where the whole is more than the sum of its parts. I thought the single choices were pretty wonky and unencouraging, but those songs slot nicely onto the album. And boy, some of the tunes they held back, like 'Thought I Was a Spaceman' and in particular 'Ghost Ship', are just fantastic.
Not sure if Blur being my favourite band makes me more critical or more forgiving than most, but whatever, I'm loving this.
So had Pharrell and Robin Thicke only noticed afterward that their song sounded like 'Got To Give It Up', rather than been inspired by it up front and admitted as much, there'd have been no lawsuit? This is such garbage.
Yeah, poor Carrie was really struggling to keep that afloat. It's too bad, because she seems like a good interviewer. The whole too cool for school vibe that Kim's got going on is super off-putting, especially coming from a person in her 60s. Seems like she really could have put more thought into her answers (maybe even beforehand, as it's not like she couldn't have anticipated a lot of those questions!). Very disappointing.
Me Moan was great and totally got ed. Which was a shame, because I felt like that really killed Gibson's momentum. This is a promising start to the next album!
Totally my thought, too. When London Queen limped out I really thought she'd lost it, and while it's not my favourite track, it works on the album. And what an album! This is pop with coherence and vision. Nice work, Charli.
Oh, and I meant to throw this in there. This review sums up my feelings pretty well:
http://www.savingcountrymusic.com/album-review-eric-churchs-the-outsiders
Eric Church is maybe my favourite male country singer, but only a few songs on this one really grab me. It's just one of those albums that critics are loving and I don't, making me suspicious that they're overcompensating for having overlooked him in the past. But you really love the album, so obviously that's not the case, and I'm glad he's getting to a wider audience. I do think that other mainstream country men like Tim McGraw (too old, old news) and David Nail (not well-known enough) made better albums, and that's saying nothing of a couple of the gals, like Lee Ann Womack and Sunny Sweeney, who really killed it this year. I guess I'm mostly sad that now that country is getting some shine here, it's going to The Outsiders. But on the other hand, yay for Sturgill!
This is BY FAR the best song on The Outsiders. I'm baffled as to how this album became a sexy critics' pick this year. Did nobody hear Chief or Carolina? Are people just suddenly playing catch-up? Eric Church's own perception of his outlaw status is driving his head further up his own ass, leading to tracks like 'The Outsiders', 'That's Damn Rock & Roll", and "Devil, Devil", all of which are embarrassing. There's a good ep somewhere in The Outsiders, but taken as an album, it's pretty brutal.
I like this album a lot, and probably the only reason I'm just short of loving it is because I love Devotion so, so much. Where that album was "sparse and restrained" all the way through, this one feels like a juxtaposition of that and a much bigger pop sound. And that big sound results in all the moments that Tom praises here and that I'm not fond of. The melodramatic strings on 'Pieces' disturb the mood for me, and ugh, that Ed Sheeran song. I hope people aren't turned off the album by Tom's praise of that one, because for me it's the dullest thing here.
But really, there's so much here to love. 'Sweetest Song'->'Kind of...'->'Want Your Feeling' is an incredible run, and the title track is insidiously gorgeous. Great write-up, even if I don't agree with every point.
I have to laugh at the people saying things like, "In five years, no one will be listening to Tinashe!" What I'm basically hearing is, "An R&B artist cannot make an album equivalent in quality to (in this case) Caribou." To me, on one hand you've got Caribou, an artist at the forefront of electronic music. On the other, you've got Tinashe, who absolutely is at the forefront of R&B. I don't buy it that the genre of the music automatically makes for a lesser album.
I'll absolutely be playing this in five years and beyond, just as I still play albums like Love Hate, The Evolution, and Aaliyah. I have Swim and Andorra, and I like them and find them interesting, but I listen to them far less than my favourite R&B.
You pretty much said it all, except I was anticipating this album so, so much, and now that it's here it surpasses expectations. on my first run through, by the time she delivered a banger with 'All Hands On Deck', I started to feel a little light-headed. This album is that good. If you haven't checked out her mixtapes, you totally should. They're not just good-for-mixtapes, they're good albums, period. 'Pretend' might now dethrone it, but 'Ecstasy' was my favourite Tinashe jam for a long while.
The Green Album is the only album I've ever returned. Under "Reason for return", I wrote, "Too short, bad". I stand by my 20-year-old self's assessment.
Until the rest of Q4 (possibly) blows them out of the water, La Roux, Mariah, and Tove are my pop albums of the year, with Tove and Mariah pretty much neck and neck in front. And if if y'all like those, too, you should check out Liz's Y2K ep. Breezy R&B jams that sound like the early 2000s.
I'm so stoked to see Tove Lo getting love here! Indulge me, here's my little Tove story:
In July 2013, my partner and I were walking across a bridge in Stockholm. I heard a familiar song and stopped to place it, and turned out it was Tove Lo's Love Ballad. And it was live! We hightailed it back the way we came and caught her free set at an outdoor hotel bar. Afterwards, my partner talked me into loitering around in the hopes that Tove would happen by. She did! And she was very lovely as we gushed about how she was going to be big and would have to come play in Canada. And now, just a little over a year later, we're seeing her tomorrow in Vancouver!
Queen of the Clouds is fantastic, too. Her Truth Serum ep was just a little above average, but this album has hooks, great production, idiosyncratic lyrics, a little humour...just everything you could want in a pop album. Chris, your write-up captures it perfectly.
In a way, I'm glad this album is getting so much praise, as Put Your Back N 2 It was one of my favourite albums of 2012 and didn't get enough attention. On the other hand, so far I'm finding Too Bright to be brittle, cold, and uninviting.
So I'm squarely on the Mr. Twin Sister train this week. That album's warm, richly melodic vibe is the opposite of what I get from Too Bright, and it's been pulling me in again and again.
Yes! I thought the first three tunes we heard were pleasant but not exciting, and I was getting a little worried about this album. But this is excellent. It's in her established soul vein but a little different, with a fully developed chorus. Love it.
Rats, I thought he was going to pull a lil wayne and sample all kinds of grunts.
I'm listening to Sam Stosur play Kaia Kanepi. Things are definitely a bleepin' and a bloopin', and it's hard to say why.
Agreed. After 'Green Lady' and the accompanying hype, I was pretty excited for this one. But I find the quality falls off precipitously after that track. 'Telephone' and 'Little Killer' sound particularly flimsy to me, and then the album just slowly wheezes out. This was a real disappointment.
I love almost everything Tinashe does, her free mixtapes are better than most albums. 'Ecstasy' is one of my favourite songs, and this one sounds great, too.
So basically, if an album doesn't appeal to you, you shouldn't comment? That would make these threads pretty one-sided, and I like seeing both sides of the discussion.
So far, "aesthetically displeasing" is a good way to express my feelings about this album. It's abrasive in a way I'm not enjoying. The tracks I'm really liking (I Prefer Your Love, Severed Cross Fingers) are those that sound the most to me like "old" St. Vincent, but with just enough different touches to renew my interest in her. Aside from the small handful of tracks I'm digging, I feel like each good moment is counteracted by a grating left turn that leaves me scratching my head. None of this has to do with my feelings about her image; I'm aware she now has grey hair, but I wouldn't think this would impact the tunes.
My God, like half the comments are from the same obnoxious asshole! Fuck off and stop wasting everyone's time, you inconsiderate shithead!
On first listen, pretty great song, not yet as arresting as Reflektor.
I probably like Sheryl Crow more than most commenters here, but even I'm not going to bother with this one. Sheryl is in no way "indie" to your predominantly North American audience (even k-pop, which I love your posts on, could kind of be considered indie in the sense that it isn't well known). But Sheryl has had no impact on indie music and hasn't even been much in the popular consciousness for about ten years, so I'm just scratching my head at the subject of this feature's debut. And to those who would say, "if you don't like it, read something else", that's why I'm commenting - I'd like to read some thoughtful discourse on something else more relevant to the audience here.
This is just bizarre. Sure, 'Blurred Lines' was inspired by 'Got to Give It Up' and the 70s. A lot of the SOUNDS are similar - the bass, the percussion. But the actual patterns and riffs seem very different to me. It's not like Santana could go around suing if people were using his guitar tone, so I don't see how Thicke could be (successfully) sued for this.
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