Listed below are the overall rankings for the best albums in history as determined by their aggregate positions in over 59,000 different greatest album charts on BestEverAlbums.com! (Chart last updated: 5 hours ago).
"I prefer this and Eat to the Beat to Parallel Lines. Not by much, but this album here is a little more surprising or something. And it's more lasting. For me, it's outlasted Parallel Lines."Reply
"I think this is Franz Ferdinand's best. I may be alone in that opinion, but that's okay: beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think people who've fallen in love with the band's unpolished debut have every right to recoil from their change in sound; in fact, this and their debut are two very di...""I think this is Franz Ferdinand's best. I may be alone in that opinion, but that's okay: beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think people who've fallen in love with the band's unpolished debut have every right to recoil from their change in sound; in fact, this and their debut are two very different albums, and I am about to judge this one on it's own terms.
On this album, catchy songs are abundant, but not the point. Alex Kapranos' knack for expressive vocals really shines on the first track, Ulysses. He sings as if his voice is an instrument - the dynamics just as important as the tune. It's what elevates it from a mere pop song into an expressive wonder, and it's production and polish add to the flavour, rather than detract from it. Turn It On and No You Girls are similarly bolstered from the production - this time benefitting from the atmosphere the songs set - an atmosphere that will carry the album. Send Him Away's time signature keeps this part of the album fresh, but ultimately is only good, and not great.
But then we run into Twilight Omens, a fantastic combination of dirty organ, powerful drums, and a vocal line that never commits itself to a single melody: it flows up and down, and always settles on a satisfying final note that completes the charm of the song. The cleanliness of the vocals makes a wonderful counterpoint to the main organ line.
Bite Hard starts gorgeous and ends awesome. What She Came For starts awesome and ends AMAZING with the heaviest Franz Ferdinand's ever been. What She Came For is especially unique in its melody of half-steps, and it's pulled off really, really well.
Live Alone and Can't Stop Feeling are the only truly forgettable songs off the album, and even Live Alone has a chorus that's good enough for one not to notice when listening to the album in one go (which is how any album should be played anyway). So what happens when the band realizes that they're losing their audience? A stroke of genius - write a curveball song that ends in an electronic symphony of bassy programmable cacophony that slowly takes over the drums - not only utterly fantastic, but very symbolic of today's world. And it's the first of three songs that make this album truly unique.
Dream Again is unlike any Franz song you've ever heard, for better or worse. Who knew a band like Franz Ferdinand could be so experimental? A tinkling of chimes, scattered handclaps, midi keyboards, and even a theremin solo all drenched in reverb make the song a treat to listen to with headphones. It slows the ending of the album to a pace which can be absorbed properly and leads nicely into it's total stylistic opposite - Katherine Kiss Me. The final song is nothing but a heartfelt acoustic guitar line with a piano solo at the end - not unlike the interludes present in You Could Have It So Much Better. It's moody, but somehow optimistic at the same time. As an ending, in my opinion at least, it's a wise choice: there's nothing more satisfying than reaching the end of an album and feeling a need to experience it all over again. The pacing is perfect - begin with a tune that starts as quiet as the ending of the album, but quickly becomes as loud and catchy as the middle. Then reach the end of the album and realize that the beginning follows perfectly afterwards. It's part of the reason Octavarium was so appealing to me.
So all in all, you have an album that's as appealing to an insightful listener as to a casual one. An album that has polish for good reason, but isn't afraid to get it's hands dirty if need be. An album that has a singer who's dynamics are astounding, and a creative masterpiece that should certainly be given a second look.
In case you wanted to know, my first Franz album was the debut, and I loved that album very much when this one came out. But I kept my mind open, and am very thankful for doing so."[+]Reply
"This album is difficult. Not an easily assessable band this record carries on in the same vein as The Modern Dance. You have to give it several listens to reap the rewards and it's worth it."Reply
"I was a 16-year old camp counselor in training, far from home in a primitive forest. I ran a high fever for two days with a horrific bout of tonsillitis. All I could do was lay on a bunk in a cabin with no air conditioning and listen to my records on headphones, sweating and hallucinating. This w...""I was a 16-year old camp counselor in training, far from home in a primitive forest. I ran a high fever for two days with a horrific bout of tonsillitis. All I could do was lay on a bunk in a cabin with no air conditioning and listen to my records on headphones, sweating and hallucinating. This was one of those records."[+]Reply
"Bragg paints a wonderfully gloomy and politically desolate picture of 80s Britain, whilst advancing his simple singer-songwriter style excellently. It's an essential piece of political music, that doesn't shy from being brilliantly honest, and delivers itself via the humble charm of Bragg's voice."Reply
"It's a polished amalgam of PJ Harvey, Kate Bush, and Siouxsie and the Banshees. Less jarring, better singing. This album has this orchestral lushness to it that I find extremely sedative."Reply
"Where do I even start with this album? It represents such a massive shift in the sound of Lenker, the beginning of the band that would come to be her most well-known musical outlet, it indicates a distinct leveling-up in the power of her songwriting, and this is the first time I have heard that i...""Where do I even start with this album? It represents such a massive shift in the sound of Lenker, the beginning of the band that would come to be her most well-known musical outlet, it indicates a distinct leveling-up in the power of her songwriting, and this is the first time I have heard that iconic (for me in my head canon) Adrianne Lenker voice. This is just a badass statement of a debut. And while it was cute and a bit funny and audacious to name their debut Masterpiece, it nearly lives up to the title.
After the cold open of sorts of the opning track “Little Arrow” we are thrust into the exhilarating and resounding triumph of a song called “Masterpiece”. Everything about this track is killer. The vocals sound like some fiery modern Lucinda Williams, the stomp of the loud drums and guitars is all that rock should be, and that fucking chorus! The lyrics and the way they morph in meeting and the way they so beautifully wrap around the melody and the breathy vocal delivery of this new Lenker we are being introduced to… etc… its awesome, every second of it is awesome from the opening chords, to the dirty feedback solo, to its resounding end. This song is such a moment, it is when you have to stop and take notice of these new young guns and shut up and listen. This is also the best song Lenker has written up to this point.
The fact that the album consistently flows from track to track, some purely indie rock bliss with noisy rock riffs to soft and folky ruminative tracks to beautiful indie pop numbers that reminds me of Beach House (without all the layers of dream pop) or Broken Social Scene, and does it with almost no hiccups or stumbles is brilliant.
Of course there are some small gripes I have. Starting with small things that always slightly annoy me, such as the opening one note explosion of the solo of “Real Love” which is just toooo much and doesn’t work (before getting back on track with a great remainder of solo), to the overly long and annoying little baby saying car and truck over and over at the end of “Interstate”. The only more macro critique is hardly a critique for me anyway (because I don’t value extreme originality) is that this great band hadn’t yet found that utterly unique Big Thief sound yet and much of the songs here, including the best ones done excellently, are quite familiar sounding. By the time they get to 2019’s 2 LPs they had carved out a truly unique sound. But I am not sure those albums are BETTER than this one (we shall see soon enough), its just that they are more unorthodox.
The star of the show her is the ragged, stalwart beauty of Adrianne Lenker’s songwriting, singing and general persona. How she managed to switch gears so fully from her Folk confessional singer/songwriter aesthetic to the fiery, rocker who forces you to hand on to every word in the middle of some deriously stomping rock tunes, baffles me. She is a chameleon and absurdly talented. The lyrics all over this thing are consistently biting, minimalisticly heartbreaking and I feel like she really made her best written album with this one. I suppose having 3 others to play with helped the songwriting process or perhaps its just that this format allowed her to unveil this whole other side of her? I don’t know. Trying to explain the indescribable relatability and fragility and strength and beauty of the singing and songwriting here is like trying to catch gossamer in your hand. This shit is elusive and powerful.
The highlights are numerous, but the TOTAL show stoppers are brilliantly placed at the beginning (“Masterpiece”), middle (“Paul”) and end (“Parallels”)… with each standout track having other great songs of a variously constituted sound and style surrounding it. This album has a flow and a consistency that I love and it just seems (so far) endlessly relistenable.
The closer starts out good, but man when I say the build up to the chorus and the chorus itself is transcendent indie rock glory just know I mean it. Also when I mentioned Broken Social Scene earlier, that could possibly apply to more than just “Paul” but I am mostly talking about that tune. It sounds like something off BSS’s 2002 album You Forgot It In People.
As far as low points, well while I kind of get what they were going with that opening track “Little Arrow” as a sort of short, super low key and fragile introduction, I still think it’s the least special and quality sounding song here. Other than that, every song here bristles with a level of energy and passion and earthy power that makes every song fascinating and uplifting and thought-provoking and just awesome.
So far, Lenker’s discog is so fucking cool. She can rock and folk with the best of ‘em. Also this album makes me excited for all the music yet to come on this project, because I think with this 2016 album she really had found her voice as a vocalist and songwriter. This is the beginning of a new era methinks. Also the relationship between Buck Meek and Adrianne Lenker and the resultant band seems to be getting more and more enmeshed. I think the whole band kicks ass here, but in particular one thing I never mentioned is the subtle harmonies between Meek and Lenker here is just as great, if more subtle, as on their A-Sides EP. And they seem to be one of those rare musical partnerships that just seem made for each other. Like Gram and Emmylou, or Guru and Premier, or other great ones. These 2 have some great music yet to come (as well as a divorce) I can already tell.
This gets a high rating, because I like it. I sometimes feel like I give too many glowing ratings. But then again the reason I pick these artists to listen to and explore is because I already KNOW I like their sound and this project just gives me a chance to really listen and listen a lot and let my thoughts blossom. With that in mind the rating for this near-masterpiece is …. 8.7/10"[+]Reply
"I thought I'd like this when I first heard about it but I just found a lot of the album to sound too silly at times and the vocals in my opinion are annoying. Didn't work for me sadly"Reply
"Can i quote the last person? It's disappointing with a couple of salvagable songs near the end, "f!@#king problems" and "1train", both coincidentally featuring many guests."Reply