Cleopatra

With the rise of indie folk in the 2000s/2010s, some groups opted for more radio-friendly approaches to their music with simpler songwriting and stripped-down rhythms. All of this polished with a nice, inoffensive production style and you've got stomp-and-holler. Mumford & Sons, Of Monsters and Men, and of course the Lumineers would be labelled as "boring" by the more negative music critics, but there's obviously more to it than that. Otherwise, we wouldn't have Kyle Gordon's recent lampoon of the genre with his song We Will Never Die or the viral internet discussion of Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros' early hit Home being considered the "worst song ever made". Clearly this sort of music does strike a chord with people, even if that chord is sour. You probably know the Lumineers from their hit Ho Hey, which is perhaps the definitive stomp and holler song with literal stomps and shouts in the song's intro. If you were paying much attention in the early 2010s then you likely heard it on the radio or in a commercial somewhere. It was a song that was moreso forced upon you than one you actively pursued. The group's songwriter Wesley Schultz said it was meant to grab people's attention because audiences kept getting bored and distracted at their shows. Incredible. This song single-handedly earned the Lumineers a best new artist and best americana album nomination at the 2013 Grammy's (losing to Fun and Bonnie Raitt, respectively) along with a boatload of album sales. Cleopatra is their follow-up. Despite charting well, this is a nothing album. It had no lasting impact, it has no memorable songs, it has nothing noteworthy about it. It's a perfectly inoffensive listen that just passes you by. It's not annoying or abrasive or disturbing, but it isn't good either. The nicest thing I can say about it is that it occasionally has some pleasant melodic runs, but even those parts never seemed to have anything to lift them up. This feels like it barely qualifies as music at all. I will not remember a thing about it. CONTENDER FOR THE LIST: Could 2010s indie folk/pop use a little more representation on the list? Sure, but probably not this album.

Disappointed in the end. Ophelia has a killer hook…that’s gets old real soon. And there were too many tracks I wanted to skip. Feels a bit harsh, but there it is.

This one didn’t have their famous song, but all the other songs sound exactly like the famous song. 2010s Coming of Age Movie sound. Of a very specific time, and I wasn’t really into them when the time was right, either.

An inoffensive stomp-clap folk album that sounds like every other inoffensive stomp-clap folk album. The first couple of songs are pretty good - the opener is quite expansive and varied while the big single Ophelia is very catchy - but there’s nothing of note later in the tracklist. Not a dreadful album, just a quite boring one, and sometimes that’s worse

I can’t diss them too much since Neyla Pekarek went to the same college as my brother and I and their hit song came out while we were at that college. I was never a huge fan beyond the one song and this album didn’t change my mind. I would have loved a cleopatra theme to this album but it didn’t feel like that at all which was a bummer.

Pretty good

Kveikir ekkert sérstaklega í mér.

Uh this genre sucks

If you were a white 20-something hipster boy with main character syndrome in the mid to late aughts, this was your schtick. If you were a white 20-something hipster "manic pixie dream girl" this was your crack.

Background music for a teen drama 2.4

Not my taste

I'll take The Fleet Foxes or Bon Iver for this sort of indie-folk thing.

There are nice melodies in here, especially bookending, which is to say that the real "in: falls limp. Neither spirited nor reaches out to mine.

Ophelia is a fucking stupid pile of shit. The Lumineers is one of those stomp clap hey bands that made the middle 2010 unbearable to listen to the radio. That fucking sucked.

Man this was so bad and so tough to get through. Seems like music perfect for shopping while in a Target or some bullshit like that.

I associate this sort of clap hey folk revivalist shite with modern day nazis and the mentally subnormal who want music like it was before black people. In short, I longed for tinnitus over this.

I dont know where to begin other than I cannot stand The Lumineers and this kind of music in general. It rubs me me the wrong way. I have a hard time hating on the user submitted albums as I recognize that whoever did submit it likes it very much and it's probably special to them on some level, but I just find this so offputting.

Oh good, more folky garbage. lol @ calling it "stomp clap hey ho" hipster music. It sure is. 1/5.