Tag: Reviews

With Love Sux, Avril Lavigne Cements Pop-Punk Legacy

For 20 years now, Avril Lavigne has swung a pendulum between her two rock personas: playful, vaguely punkish pop (see: “Sk8er Boi,” “Girlfriend” and “Here’s to Never Growing Up”) and self-serious alternative (“My Happy Ending,” “Nobody’s Home” and that unfortunate collaboration with Chad Kroeger in 2013). Yet despite regular attempts to shift her sound — […]

February 24, 2022
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Big Thief’s Mammoth New Album Overflows With Indie-Folk Ambition

To label Big Thief’s panoramic new project a “double album” is something of a misnomer. In totality, the 81-minute mammoth that is Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You is not two halves but four quarters, divided by as many distinct recording sessions, in upstate New York; Topanga Canyon, California; the Colorado Rocky Mountains; […]

February 10, 2022
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Taylor Swift Remakes Heartbreak Odyssey With Red (Taylor’s Version)

Red was already Taylor Swift’s greatest album, her bittersweet spot between the confessional heartache that defined the megastar’s earliest songwriting and the stadium-pop grandeur that would inform her next trio of colossal LPs (1989, Reputation and Lover). It was the ultimate millennial breakup album, a touchstone of lovelorn devastation, fury, hope and reflection for all […]

November 12, 2021
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Mick Jenkins Shines the Spotlight on the Elephant in the Room

Mick Jenkins’ third studio album, Elephant in the Room, confronts the issues that haunt his relationships with others, wedging between him and the world. Across the album, the Chicago MC’s deft flows and cool delivery explore the unspoken barriers in his personal and professional life. At some points, Jenkins himself appears as the titular elephant […]

November 1, 2021
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