The middle of the album really falters. Love the start and the end though. May just not be for me. I used to say I was a big fan of folk, bluegrass, banjo n the likes... maybe not as much, though?
Solid 4* album. I love the genre!
This is it. The first 5*! Such a pleasant, pleasant listen. Especially the intro track--bravo!
First album in the 1001 that entered "dislike" zone. Seriously. My highlight: the lyricism was occasionally wonderful. My letdowns: just the instrumentation, the slow pace of it all, the bleak mood that doesn't carry much at all. Super downer album for no great reason. And I came in thinking I'd love it. Sorry.
Second 5*. Every song is a hit, very pleasant listen. Great rock.
Just... I like house, but not like this.
I LOVED Heaven, but the rest of the album... not sure it hit that great?
You know it's dire when you forgot you listened to this album already.
That's right, I didn't see it rated so I said, "drat! Gotta go listen." And guess what? Holy hell is this forgettable.
It's so disappointing because Girls Just Wanna Have Fun is a queer club staple. Well, surprise surprise, that song wasn't really the highlight--in fact I'd reckon it only stays in my head because of the hours I spent dancing to it.
Time After Time and the opener (uh, what was it again?) are okay. I can't really recommend everything else. Honorable mention goes to When You Were Mine, that started okay and was so grating that by the end of the song I wanted to tear a turntable needle through my collection of OST vinyls to get something that would've sounded better anyway.
This is an exquisitely made concept album for an absolutely horrifying concept.
Musically, it works brilliantly in what it communicates--passion, intensity, the very "French" first love. The instrumentation and the spoken word is magnificent. It's an artwork.
But dear God does it instill horror. Perhaps it is not as vile for the pedophile-friendly intelligentsia of France, but for a modern audience, it's... disgusting. It's disgusting in its earnestness and the energy and passion that underlines its conveyance. It's disgusting! This is hideous! Oh, and it did send me into a rabbithole of France's beautifully appalling history with pedo tolerance, so there's that...
4* for the musicality and 1* for the pedophilic (not-really-under)tones. Enjoyment? I don't know. You ever watch something that's absolute straight horror in how earnest it does some stuff? I mean, it made me FEEL, I guess? Maybe I'll give it a 4* for how effectively it creeped me out, eh? Sound about right.
This is surprisingly such a nice, easy-to-enjoy album. Not much to say, I think, but I can't actually find a fault, and this is my second listen going in. Hell yeah!
THIS IS SOOOOOOO GOOOOOOOD.
I'm at work and can't type out a full review but godDAMN. I know my standards are pretty soft when it comes to lyrically-driven/story-centered music--I understand that some say this work is not as sonically impressive as Kendrick's future work--but what's here is magnificent.
Shoutout to Money Trees, Swimming Pools (Drank), and the absolute masterpiece that is Sing About Me, I'm Dying of Thirst.
Need to keep this short, but oh my god.
If GKMC was a concept album in perfect execution, then TPAB is an absolutely transcendental piece of art. Sonically richer, lyrically more dense and infinitely much more intense of a listening experience, with production unlike anything I'd ever heard before (GOSH was this album just a sonic experience through and through).
After my first listen I had still said I preferred GKMC more (it's a little rawer, less refined/polished), but what's important to note is that they're really just... different, overall. TPAB sounds much more matured and cleaner, but also less "listenable" (wrt. individual tracks), per se--it feels like an album designed to be noskipped from start to finish, and I can appreciate that.
Sorta like the Suburbs, ha ha.
Big problem on my end is that it's just such a dense piece of art that processing it is really overwhelming. I'm going back in for a third listen currently and there's just more to unpack. This definitely detracts from replayability. It's an actual brain exercise listening to this with any form of intention (unless you just want to melt to the music, which is aight too). I might not revisit after a couple of plays, honestly. Maybe a listen every couple of months. But it's a masterpiece, and that's all that matters.
OOoooooh la-la. This was SUCH a good indie electro-pop album. My sibling is a HUGE fan of CHVRCHES so I knew I had to get in on it someday (thanks, 1001!), but I definitely wasn't expecting what I listened to.
Likes: vocals, great and incredibly complex (rhythmically and harmonically) production, and the flow and cohesion of each INDIVIDUAL song is really powerful.
BIIG criticism would be that the album definitely feels like it falls off in terms of cohesiveness at the tail end of it all. The last 5(6?) songs definitely feel like they stand alone as singles more than as elements of an album. Not sure if that makes sense, but that's what I felt -- wasn't sure if I was on the same album at some point, and the feeling never felt away.
SUCH a great piece of work, though. Awesome introduction to electropop for anyone looking to get into the genre.
