UFOF is going to be a hard one to top for me, as I prefer my Big Thief with a little more studio polish than most, but I've been listening to the new songs pretty much on repeat for the past month. In all of the stacked February release calendar, this is the one I'm most excited about.
Reading their statement makes me sad—I kinda wish SG would at least take the link to the YouTube video down now that we know the artists don't want people to listen to it.
It's like when Karen O's demos she made for Tunde & friends leaked online. Has gotta feel like something you made is losing its specialness and intimacy when it's out there for everyone to hear :(
Dude, seriously. Goosebumps from the Deak! Cherokee is another early fav, but honestly the whole thing is grabbing me. I love the pretty straightforward exotica instrumentation throughout, and the harmonies are goooooorgeous.
Wait wait wait, is this a hot take, that Bono's lyrics/mojo is the weak spot of U2? Dude can sing, obviously, but it's WHAT he sings that generally drives me bonkers.
Maaaaybe my favorite song of the year so far, holy shit. She squeezed so much into a couple short minutes! Stoked to hear the Arca productions on this thing, too. The teaser of the title track sounded certifiably bonkers.
We're getting basically Radiohead, Beach House, Big Thief, Bjork, Danny Brown, Spoon, who knows what else...will this finally be the year that outdoes 2007 for my favorite year of music ever?
These shows were in-freakin-credible. These songs, more than anything Thom's done since, sound like a continuation of In Rainbows-era Radiohead. I can't wait for the album!
Also, Open the Floodgates has been my favorite Thom bootleg for, like, a decade. The wait was worth it—up there with Dawn Chorus and Videotape as one of the prettiest songs he's ever done.
Born To Die came out exactly one month and six days after I came out. It was such a rough time for me—my mental health was terrible, I’d been hospitalized for a suicide attempt, and was pretty regularly getting shat on by friends/family members who weren’t cool with the whole “gay” thing. Video Games had already been out for awhile and soundtracked some dark times for me, but when BtD dropped, it was revelatory. The combination of music and Lana’s give-no-fucks attitude legit helped me seize some power inside of me I didn’t know I had. Songs like Summertime Sadness and Born to Die are like tiny time machines back to that first year of being out—visiting my first gay bars, kissing strangers on the dance floor, piecing together a new community bit by bit. This album (in its own weird way) might represent the power of music to me more so than any other album I can think of.
My early 20s isn’t a time I like to revisit much, so I don’t really listen to BtD often anymore. But I’m eternally grateful to this album for cradling me when I needed it and to Lana for teaching me how to be more confident. xoxo
The production here is great—really enjoy the backing track throughout, and it's clear that she's a solid producer. What's missing for me is the songwriting. Visions had a handful of weirdo production experiments, but it also had some really stellar writing throughout. None of the stuff she's done in the past couple of album cycles has made me felt anything close to what Oblivion, Genesis, or Symphonia IX did back in the day.
I totally agree that everything I saw and read of Music seemed totally and inarguably terrible/offensive/ableist. It also seemed pretty clear that Sia wasn't trying to be any of those things. And while it definitely doesn't excuse her from criticism/make the impact of what she did any less damaging, I can also sympathize with how shitty it's gotta feel to basically learn your whole ethos is fucked up in such a public, all-encompassing way. I'm glad she's not suicidal anymore.
If you haven’t heard Adrienne’s Instagram live version, do yourself the favor and check it out (it’s on YouTube). It blows this one out of the water, though this is nice too ☺️ So stoked for February releases!
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