I prefer If You're Feeling Sinister to Boy With the Arab Strap, but in no way does the latter deserve anything lower than 6.0. Yeah, it's a disappointment when stacked against If You're Feeling Sinister, but on its own terms, Boy is a great album, toned down, but very good. .6 is really just unreasonable, and the reviewer didn't do a good job of backing up the score in the review either.
Posts: 120 | Location: California | Registered: 04 January 2008
OK, I haven't heard the album yet because it doesn't come out until tomorrow, but I read the cokemachineglow review of El Perro del Mar, From the Valley to the Stars. The album may well be disappointing, but there's NO WAY it deserves a 41%. The reviewer even went out of his way to throw some disrespect Jens Lekman's way. I can only guess the guy had a bad experience with a Volvo or an Electrolux--why else would he have an axe to grind against the Swedes?
I ordered the album from the record store in my neighborhood. If it does suck that much, I'll be back to offer an apology.
Posts: 127 | Location: New York | Registered: 18 September 2007
I wish I could find the scan of Q magazine's review of The Knife's "Silent Shout". I know its a tad bit overrated (Pitchfork's AotY 2006 has never sat right with me.), but HALF A STAR out of five?!
Drugs, seriously, drugs. Oh wait, that might actually make them like the album better.
I absolutely love Silent Shout and find that rating to be strange... but for some reason it doesn't bother me. I guess I don't place much emphasis on reviews..
I am following up on my previous post about cokemachineglow's 41% rating of El Perro del Mar, From the Valley to the Stars. Pitchfork's review was also less than stellare--67--and I was preparing for the worst, but now that I have heard it, I love this album.
The reviewer called El Perro's first album "phenomenal". I would speculate that maybe he liked it so much he started to feel a little possessive of the music, and then he took it personally when the second album didn't turn out as he thought it should. I felt the same way about the first album, which I suppose is why I started to feel offended by the bad review before I had even heard the entire album.
I don't intend to give a competing review, but I think the songs are beautifully composed and skillfully and inventively arranged. I don't think the lyrics are "trite", I just think the focus was on Ms. Assbring's voice and not on the words. I don't understand the reference to "an anonymous, bored studio band" at all. There's nothing generic about this music--I particularly enjoyed the unusual and unexpected church-hymn sound of "Do Not Despair" and "Happiness Won Me Over".
Of course reviews are opinions and are not meant to be entirely objective, but I think in this case a 41/100 rating is unjustifiably harsh.
Posts: 127 | Location: New York | Registered: 18 September 2007
Originally posted by cuneyt81: I thought Pitchfork's review of the new Long Blondes album sold it pretty short.
I'm disliking the album so far. I don't like the change in style (more new wave then punk). I feel like Kate Jackson's vocals aren't as used and lyrically it takes a step back from StDYH.
Really? I think it is an excellent progression all around. The New Wave sound is keeping with the current indie trends, but at the same time it's from their own perspective; a different take on the current 80s trend (much like their last record was a different take on the trendy post-punk sound of the time). Also, the majority of the delivery comes off just as convincing and emotive as on Someone To Drive You Home, lyrically and instrumentally. The lyrics themselves I can't so much comment on because that is the aspect I place the least amount of emphasis on, but it did just what I hoped it would: continue on the themes from their debut and take them to the next level, offer closure.
Originally posted by JustSomeIdiot: RapReviews.com's review of Why - Alopecia is kind of silly.
It's a site that primarily reviews hip hop bashing an album that's in no way hip hop for not being hip hop enough.
Man. This review was just bad. Perhaps they just know their reader base won't like it so they are trying to warn them away? But aside from being half gibberish that never truely criticed the music for it's own merit (but rather how "Hip-Hop" it was), the writing was hideous, and the website was one of the awfullest things I've ever looked at on the internet.
Also, the Why? lyric "I thought I had a pebble in my sock, etc..." is amazing.
---------------------------- I'm the operator with my pocket calculator.
The Shearwater review today on TinyMixTapes is probably one of the worst reviews I've ever read. Reducing them to a Talk Talk tribute band is beyond stupid. It's like the guy listened on a purely surface level and left it at that. I mean, if you really don't like the record, I can understand that, but this one is just insulting.
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