quote:

Originally posted by BContrat:
Pretty accurate score from pitchfork, but I think it deserved the "Best New Music" distinction as well.

On at least a few albums lately they have stuck the best new music tag on later in the day.

quote:

Originally posted by FragileKidA:
I got around to listening to this and it's not that as good as some may think. There's nothing especially moving about it and a lot of the songs start well without really going anywhere.

The singing is particularly horrible. The singer reminds me of Eef Barzelay and his nasally delivery is off-putting. But even worse, the female vocalist is tone death. Plus her voice is all throat and she sings with no conviction. It's a shame they let her voice close the album out, poor choice.

Wow, usually I tend to agree with your tastes, but I think maybe you need to give this one more time.

I find Edenloff's voice full of character. A lot of range between the almost Billy Corgan like performance on Luciana, and the desperate hush of Sleep All Day, and none of it sounds forced or unnatural.

The female vocals I can agree could drag the album down if they weren't so well placed, but the way they are used are more of an accent of sweetness on In The Summertime or a bluegrassy dissonance on Four Night Rider.

As far as not being moving, or going nowhere, I just don't understand where you are coming from. I can understand maybe not liking the vocals at first, and for some people the songs might seem a little unrefined, but this is moving stuff man. Sincerity is the strong point.

Hey all:

I just wrote up a case study about how the RAA has broken through into the indie mainstream. I borrowed pretty heavily from this thread (thanks to the Fall of Troy and all the rest of you), so I figured I'd post it here. Hope you like it and that I didn't mess up the story too much:

http://hitsingularity.wordpres...dvantage-case-study/

quote:

Originally posted by Tom Williams:
Hey all:

I just wrote up a case study about how the RAA has broken through into the indie mainstream. I borrowed pretty heavily from this thread (thanks to the Fall of Troy and all the rest of you), so I figured I'd post it here. Hope you like it and that I didn't mess up the story too much:

http://hitsingularity.wordpres...dvantage-case-study/

This was beautifully written and synthesized. Great job, I loved it. Can't wait to see them Friday.

quote:

Originally posted by FragileKidA:
I got around to listening to this and it's not that as good as some may think. There's nothing especially moving about it and a lot of the songs start well without really going anywhere.

The singing is particularly horrible. The singer reminds me of Eef Barzelay and his nasally delivery is off-putting. But even worse, the female vocalist is tone death. Plus her voice is all throat and she sings with no conviction. It's a shame they let her voice close the album out, poor choice.

Two idiotic comments in one night! You're on a roll, FKA. (Yes, I'm still angry at your presumptuous comments made in a different thread)

quote:

Originally posted by FragileKidA:
I got around to listening to this and it's not that as good as some may think.

Well, it's certainly no Mos Def

quote:

Originally posted by crob3888:

quote:

Originally posted by Tom Williams:
Hey all:

I just wrote up a case study about how the RAA has broken through into the indie mainstream. I borrowed pretty heavily from this thread (thanks to the Fall of Troy and all the rest of you), so I figured I'd post it here. Hope you like it and that I didn't mess up the story too much:

http://hitsingularity.wordpres...dvantage-case-study/

This was beautifully written and synthesized. Great job, I loved it. Can't wait to see them Friday.

Wow! Great write-up Tom. You have met the band, so you can understand this better than most. The best part of this whole story is that Nils, Amy, and Paul are truly nice people. It's so rewarding to see them doing well.

quote:

Originally posted by The Fall of Troy:

quote:

Originally posted by FragileKidA:
I got around to listening to this and it's not that as good as some may think. There's nothing especially moving about it and a lot of the songs start well without really going anywhere.

The singing is particularly horrible. The singer reminds me of Eef Barzelay and his nasally delivery is off-putting. But even worse, the female vocalist is tone death. Plus her voice is all throat and she sings with no conviction. It's a shame they let her voice close the album out, poor choice.

Wow! This is something I did not expect from you, FKA.

Well, to each his own.

Don't mind FKA. He just likes soulless, 'corporate' rock like Grizzly Bear.

Not a Best New Music, but a good score from Pitchfork nonetheless--an 8.0. Haven't read the review yet, but I'm glad they rated it so highly; this'll definitely gain the RAA some much-deserved exposure.

Here's a round-up of MC reviews that I have seen so far:

sputnikmusic.com 90 (4.5/5)
Pitchfork 80 (8.0/10)
Under the Radar 80 (8/10)
cokemachineglow 77
AV Club 75 (B grade)
All Music Guide 60 (3/5 stars - WTF)

It's looking like the average may by in the high 70s, maybe about 77. Not bad, but I obviously think the album deserves a low 80s.

Edit: Hey, I noticed that Mos Def's new album got BNM on P4k with the same score. How does that work? Doesn't everything 80 or up get BNM?

This message has been edited. Last edited by: The Fall of Troy,

It's been a while since I've posted here, but I'll contribute a few thoughts on this album that is very beloved by many in the MC community.

This is a very good album that gets better with each listen. I downloaded it a couple months ago on emusic and have found myself returning to it pretty regularly. As for the NMH comparisons, I definitely see it with "Luciana" and a little bit with "Frank, AB" in the way Nils draws out his vowels, but this seems a lot less "out there" and more relatable for me. His voice reminds me in other places of the guy from They Might Be Giants. As for Amy, her parts are some of my favorites. I'm a sucker for light, airy female vocals. Whether they're "emotional" or whatever seems irrelevant to me. Her voice suits the mood of the songs well. Favorites currently are "Don't Haunt This Place," "The Deadroads," and "Four Night Rider." My only real complaint would be the vocals on "Deathbridge..." which are a bit grating on an otherwise enjoyable song. But I'm really happy to see this band getting a lot of love and glad that you guys have been instrumental in introducing people to them. I know I wouldn't have checked them out without reading about them here. Another thing, going back to nmeiborg's original post cited in the link above, I remember that post, because that's what got me to check out one of my favorites from last year, Wagonwheel Blues by The War On Drugs (about a year ago?). Now going back and seeing the RAA in the same post, I've got to give congrats to him for his awesome recommendations.

quote:

Edit: Hey, I noticed that Mos Def's new album got BNM on P4k with the same score. How does that work? Doesn't everything 80 or up get BNM?

Nah. The BNM tag seems pretty arbitrary. I've seen plenty of 8+ reviews without it. The new Future of The Left springs to mind.

quote:

Originally posted by youandwhosearmy:

quote:

Edit: Hey, I noticed that Mos Def's new album got BNM on P4k with the same score. How does that work? Doesn't everything 80 or up get BNM?

Nah. The BNM tag seems pretty arbitrary. I've seen plenty of 8+ reviews without it. The new Future of The Left springs to mind.

Yeah just in the past couple weeks they have given at least 3 albums scores above 8.0 and not awarded the BNM. I don't know what criteria they have.

quote:

Originally posted by dza360:
Wow, usually I tend to agree with your tastes, but I think maybe you need to give this one more time.

Hey, thanks for the tactful response dza, appreciate it.

My main problem is that it feels like an OK band releasing a decent debut. I am also guessing that they come off as thrilling live but in studio, not so much. The music is good and it's a respectable debut but it has its faults: awkward progressions, a very good drummer who needs to flourish more, smart pop sensibilities that are developing and a multi-instrumentalist (Amy Cole) who should not be singing.

While I knew I needed to be careful as to what I posted (seeing as how most everyone who heard it here loved it), this is the discussion thread for this album so I wanted to share what I thought. I agree with you that the lead singer's voice has character and really isn't that annoying.

quote:

Originally posted by FragileKidA:

quote:

Originally posted by dza360:
Wow, usually I tend to agree with your tastes, but I think maybe you need to give this one more time.

Hey, thanks for the tactful response dza, appreciate it.

My main problem is that it feels like an OK band releasing a decent debut. I am also guessing that they come off as thrilling live but in studio, not so much. The music is good and it's a respectable debut but it has its faults: awkward progressions, a very good drummer who needs to flourish more, smart pop sensibilities that are developing and a multi-instrumentalist (Amy Cole) who should not be singing.

While I knew I needed to be careful as to what I posted (seeing as how most everyone who heard it here loved it), this is the discussion thread for this album so I wanted to share what I thought. I agree with you that the lead singer's voice has character and really isn't that annoying.

I think dza more artfully expressed what I was feeling when I read your post. Our tastes have always seemed so close, I was shocked by your reaction to the album. But, as I said, to each his own.

That being said, I can understand that some people were taken aback by your post. I think this is a fitting analogy - you just walked into a Star Trek convention and shouted that you hate Star Trek because William Shattner and Leonard Nemoy can't act. Like Trekkers, we are all a little nuts on this thread when it comes to the RAA. I think under those circumstances, you got off pretty easy.

The metacritic link, since they can't seem to get the site updated:

http://www.metacritic.com/musi...aadvantage/hometowns

Its at 75 right now.

quote:

Originally posted by The Fall of Troy:
I was shocked by your reaction to the album. But, as I said, to each his own.

That being said, I can understand that some people were taken aback by your post.

I was more taken aback by the tone of the comment: "It's not as good as you think," whereas most people would say "I don't like this as much as most of you seem to."

hmmmm...

quote:

Originally posted by RavingLunatic:

quote:

Originally posted by The Fall of Troy:
I was shocked by your reaction to the album. But, as I said, to each his own.

That being said, I can understand that some people were taken aback by your post.

I was more taken aback by the tone of the comment: "It's not as good as you think," whereas most people would say "I don't like this as much as most of you seem to."

I agree that it was poor word choice, and argueably very untactful, especially from someone that was hoping for a tactful response. But I think we can all agree it was just a harmless misphrasing, and not actually an attempt to pretend other people opinions are invalid.

I've realized FragileKidA in general puts a lot of weight into the vocalists singing ability. And for people that feel a vocalists ability is important, or their inability is distracting, I could see them having a dificult time with The RAA. Personally, the vocal ability doesn't affect me much. My brain listens for sincerity, vocal dynamics and an ability to fit the vocals into the music and mood of the song, good or bad. So, I didn't realize until Frag pointed it out that the vocal tracks here would sound pretty excruciating if they were pulled out and listened to on their own.

It's not an opinion I share, but I think it's a perspective that's good to have out on the table.

On the issue of the reviews that are coming out right now. I really have to wonder when the reviewers first heard the album, and wether that has some impact on their reviews. It's possible that some enthusiasm has cooled over the past year since the album has been out for so long.

quote:

Originally posted by Shadrach:

I've realized FragileKidA in general puts a lot of weight into the vocalists singing ability.

See I thought the opposite because most of the time I agree with him on hip-hop music, which isn't about technical vocal ability at all, and is more about the qualities you describe Shad