Racine carrée

Very Eurovision but enjoyable

Listened to three songs. More than enough to know this isn't my thing. I feel bad for the kid, because based on the picture I saw of him on the album cover, he's just a disembodied head. Sad really. 2 stars.

Alors, bedoel, Stromae’s Art, the way he performs, the topics he raises and the unity he brings to Belgians (although he sings in French) makes him one of the most import performers of Belgium this decade. Hope he is well.

I'm sorry I'm tired and don't feel like going to the club tonight. You go ahead without me.

Ok, now this is some really interesting French music, and I love the Afro-Caribbean inspirations.

Formidable!! How Stromae puts dark and depressive lyrics on a heavy house beat is incredible. And the variation of ballads and more dancable songs is stunning.

Masterpiece. Still an bsolute banger.

4 or 5 Yea thats a 5 Every single european probably knows half these songs by heart

Rating: 10/10

Superb!

That was quite fun!

This was one of the albums I thought might be in this project, so I was very glad to see it here! I think it's the best francophone album of at least the last 20 years. Love it lots!

Vraiment bon, je connaissais bien du au fait que ca a jouer comme ca a pas de sens quand c'est sortit mais ca du bien d'avoir prit un pas de recul pour apprécié d'avantage. 4.5

In a bit of serendipity my friend introduced me to Stromae a few weeks ago. Cool Belgian party music

Nice one. Should have been on the list 100%

This was pretty cool. Catchy europop. Didn't go off on too many strange tangents. Just did what it suggested it would. 4/5.

I don't why I don't listen to this more often. It is so good and catchy. And I respect and admire his guts to speak up about difficult subjects like cancer, suicide, etc. Great job!

surprise album! really enjoyed it, even not knowing what the heck they were singing about. Dig it. Gonna go listen to Cheese now.

I didn't get much from this album on the first listen until the last few tracks. Upon a second listen, I was struck by the musicality and production. The use of African and Caribbean influences folded into a electronic framework including French House, Trap, and electro-pop works incredibly well. My French is not as great as I would like so I wasn't able to pick out the lyrics well, but from what I read in translation, this album is not shy about confronting social issues. Overall, this album is a success and should be better known by non-Francophone audiences.

Glad to see this one on here. I listened to this when it came out, and I'm a big fan.

This was a fun listen! Some of the songs hit better than others, but great overall.

Fun!

So many bangers on this album

Sure, i didn't understand it, but the energy and fun combined with the fact that it is pretty unrepresented in the book, made this an enjoyable listen. Humain a l'eau was probably the only tough one to get through, but the rest were cool electronic pop.

its upbeat, energetic without being too over the top. It does have a "club" feel to it, but I like the way he's able to weave different styles/genres into this album. Great recommendation.

House, electropop, dance-pop. Me ha gustado bastante. Un 4. Casi un 5.

Stromae proves as interesting at least as many of the French artists featured on the main list. This album lost a bit of steam in the second half, I found, though there's the language barrier and unfamiliarity with international dance music (hah! all dance music) scenes. Brings energy without the cliché of certain French rap.

Interesante por determinados conceptos.

House ehhhh. French House. Not horrible but nothing I wanna hear at home. Take me to da club.

DESPITE the FRENCH there are some catchy moments in here that make an energetic morning listen

Starting out I was feeling this activated my main gripe with so much on the kind of EDM spectrum in that I just find the music boring. It grew on me throughout the album though and finished strongly. As always being unable to appreciate the lyrics due to my language barrier makes it hard to fully assess.

I like tous les memes. Don't really like papaoutai. Everything else is decently listenable. 6/10

Very interesting blend of Belgian/French dance/ world music. I must admit that prefer the other great Belgian group Balthazar though.

Being a sad dumb monolingual man, I miss out on a lot of the lyrical content; a shame, considering that some of the themes I'm reading about seem like they'd resonate with me, and lots of people seem to find witty and biting cleverness here. But, purely going off the musical content, this is just... okay, for me at least. I like the sort of afro-cuban vibes I get from the beats, which blended with the french language and house synths makes for quite an interesting flavor combination. However, all the synth sounds and effects used give me PTSD flashbacks to high school dances I would be dragged along to. I can guarantee high school me would have given this one star lol. Even with that old distaste, though, I can't deny how clean the production is here!

Dude really masters putting together some very catchy tunes and a stage persona to go with it.

Enjoyable. He sings/raps slow enough for my French to keep up and it’s clever and often funny. The music is bouncy and varied. Not necessarily groundbreaking, but good to hear something popular from outside UK/USA. The list could do with more francophone albums (my 1980s musical love affair would have been satisfied with an Indochine, but not a Telephone!).

Very Enjoyable

Catchy and often foot stompingly fun, with a level of nuance and substance I don't typically expect in this type of music. I fully expected to tire of this quickly, but it gets more interesting as the album progresses. I feel like this album fills a couple of the many gaps on the original 1001 list, both for post-millennial dance pop and music from non-English speaking artists. I like how Stromae takes musical ideas that feel very traditionally "French" and flips them around, incorporating world music sounds to make them current and add depth. Fave Songs: Tous les mêmes, Ave Cesaria, Papaoutai, Carmen, Humain à l'eau, Quand c'est ?

Enjoyed it, don't speak French so couldn't really appreciate but enjoyed a lot of tracks while they were playing

Without doubt the best Belgian electronica album I've heard to date. Rating: 2.5 Playlist track: Moules Frites Date listened: 31/09/24

Fíla þessa stemmingu.

Tough call on this one – while the LP picked up in the back half with better arrangements and varied instrumentals, I can't shake the PTSD of the 2011-2014 EDM period that this invokes in me. The front half especially leans hard into synth presets that defined (for better but mostly worse) the techno revival of the early 'teens and felt a bit flat songwriting-wise. Later tracks like 'Formidable' are beautiful and carry a quiet strength, but aren't enough to outweigh an album that's perhaps a bit overstuffed with dated content.

A French electronic album. I couldn't understand the words which is fine. It wasn't too long but it felt like it went on a little too long. It's between a 2 and a 3.

French rave music. If you're into this kinda stuff I'm sure it's great but not for me.

Not completely without merit but definitely not my thing

I try to spend my year avoiding Eurovision, so this just isn’t my cup of tea. My wife who loves Eurovision enjoyed it though.

wow, je n'avais aucune idée de ce qui se passait dans cet album. c'était comme un rêve de pop électronique française pour lequel je n'avais pas de traducteur. c'est pourquoi cette revue est en français. comme c'est triste 2.5/10