This is one of those albums I absolutely adored as a teenager upon release and played to death... only for Pitchfork at their peak cultural influence to tell me in college that my feelings about it were invalid with their 1.9 rating of his second album... I never really took him seriously again, and convinced myself that his music was banal and reductive. Taking it today at face value, O is still an absolutely gorgeous album, and I regret that a music website that exposed me to so much incredible music also influenced me to dismiss others. That's music criticism though!
She previewed this song at Pitchfork this past summer (she was a last minute fill-in for Cassandra Jenkins) and had the audience do a call and response with the lyrics. Love how the studio version turned out and so excited for this album.
Was hoping for an Amber Mark writeup this week... every advance single has been fantastic, (esp. "Competition' and 'What it is') my most anticipated album for some time now. Really hope it takes off.
Loving the Anxious album from last week's AOTW though, will give this one a try too!!
I totally get your point with streaming. However, when I think of future one-hit wonders from the past few years, I doubt that Tones & I (Dance Monkey), Masked Wolf (Astronaut in the Ocean), Arizona Zervas (Roxanne), CJ (Whoopty) or hell, maybe even 24KGoldn (Mood) will ever dent the charts in a major way again...
I feel like no one really takes Swing Out Sister seriously from a critical standpoint but their cover of this song from 1994 is just so so so great too.
Absolutely. Not to name names but agreed that BTS Army's chart rigging is waaaaaay more offensive than what Drake and Kanye do with their 21 and 27-track long albums. I'm still miffed that "Butter" is officially "Song of the Summer" due to the sheer fact that 150,000 fans kept buying the same song over and over week after week.
Was there today, the show was fantastic. Magnetic stage presence and her voice is impeccable live. And the audience was so hot it legit hurt my feelings.
Celeste seems to get ignored as she's definitely in the Amy Winehouse/Adele/Emeli Sande lane, but damn does her album have some really great stuff. I've gotten a ton of mileage from "Not Your Muse" this year.
My parents are both still alive, but this song hits such a nerve every time I hear it. My dad played this song endlessly when I was a child as he never knew his father... and this song takes on a different meaning to me with the misunderstandings / permanent rift in my relationship with my father due to being gay. I'm sure this song will only take on more meaning for me as time goes by.
I grew up in an evangelical school in the 90's, and my first exposure to this song was in 4th grade ~1994 in music class when we were taught about acapella music.
The teacher thought the song was "un-Christian" in that it was insinuating that we shouldn't worry and just do what makes us feel good, so we were taught to sing the chorus, "Don't worry.... (Trust Jesus!) Be happy..."
I still can't hear the song without thinking of that in the middle of it. Scarred for life.
I'm likely in the vast minority on this, but every holiday season I return back to Sia's Christmas album with more fondness and nostalgia than the year before. It's spotty and not a front to back classic, but the only Christmas album from this century I return to every year.
This album was my introduction to PJ Harvey when I was 14, buying it on impulse at Target... seeing the Thom Yorke feature after Kid A had just rocked my world. Saw her open for U2 with my dad in Lexington KY just a few months later. The angst and unease and and seething feminine energy/badassery really spoke to me as a closeted gay evangelical kid, even if I hadn't quite figured that all out yet. I feel like this album is the ideal entry point to PJ's catalog and that a generation of people my age found her through this one. Anyway, lots of loose/random thoughts here but this album had a real impact on my teenage years and still easily one of my all time faves.
Glad to see they decided to give this one another push, since here we are a full five months after the Doja Cat remix and "Blinding Lights" is STILL number 1 on US radio...
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