ALBUM REVIEW: Atoms For Peace- AMOK
The other week, I decided it would be a good day to revisit Radiohead’s divisive The King of Limbs. Since it’s been out, I’ve considered it to be the worst Radiohead album. I mean, most people would argue that Pablo Honey is their worst, but at least that album had Creep and Blow Out, and at least sounded full of potential (Which, thank god, was fully realized). On The King of Limbs, everything is pretty and ominous, but it is a trudge. It was basically the sonic equivalent of watching paint dry. Save the alright Lotus Flower, there was something that just felt off. And it’s not like the songs themselves were bad. The From the Basement session they did was absolutely stunning. However, when all this stuff was recorded, there’s just a lack of passion…almost a lack of humanity.
That’s the same problem I got from this new effort from this “Spin-off” super group. Atoms For Peace has Radiohead vocalist Thom Yorke and producer Nigel Godrich, Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Flea, Joey Waronker (who has worked with Beck and R.E.M.), and Mauro Refosco (No clue). The album sounds heavily electronic, spacious, and eerie. It often feels like a balancing act on a tight rope. There’s never any sense of comfort, and there are moments where it seems like it’s going to fall off. Atoms For Peace kind of pull off the balancing act, but they almost hit the ground hard many times.
There are moments that are sonically great. Default is a song that’s grown on me quite a bit. It’s complex, and it’s full of electronic clicks and ominous bass that really make it stick out. But then there’s a lot where things get either monotonous or ugly. The repeated synths on Ingenue are awkward, and Yorke’s singing on the song feels more weak and wimpy than soft and sensitive.
The album’s incredibly sparse, with a whole lot of open space. There are parts where it begins to fill, but most of the time it feels compressed. That gives a lot of the clicks and synths little wiggle room, which makes a lot of things jut kind of…not work. Synths often overwhelm nearly everything else in the mix, save Yorke’s whispers. While his voice is weak, it’s still louder than nearly everything else. While it’s nice to hear Yorke’s whisper every once in a while, there’s no change dynamically at all during all of his vocals. Even the more intense moments maintain an uncomfortable quiet.
Also, there aren’t any songs that really stick out. Sure, there are some albums that have a bunch of songs with equal quality. But this album’s consistent level of quality is relatively mediocre. None of the songs bring much to the table, and after a while each song sounds the same. The first half of the album is somewhat good, but the second half becomes a test of endurance. The songs are complex, but after a while you begin to see the patterns, and the wonder in that complexity begins to wane.
This album really just feels OK. The sonic ideas are somewhat interesting (if inconsistent), but after a while they just get monotonous. Songs just repeat the same patterns. The King of Limbs was a bit monotonous, but at least it kind of felt like the songs grew as they went along. Here, the plant dies in the first two minutes, and then it’s extended for two more verses of the same thing.
Other than Yorke and Producer Godrich, you can’t hear a lot of the efforts of the other band mates. The percussion is nice, but rarely heard. And I could only hear Flea on two or three songs. It really just feels like a Yorke solo album. One that’s really underwhelming.
However, the album isn’t unlistenable. Most of it is pleasant, and there isn’t much that’s terribly offensive. It’s just boring. All of these guys (Save Refosco, who I’ve never heard of before) have done better work before, and this album underwhelms when towered over by all the other projects that proceeded it.
Summary: It sounds nice enough, but Amok suffers from monotony and weak production.
Choice Cuts: Default
2.5/5
Stream Default and Judge Jury and Executioner below. AMOK is out Tuesday (3/26) on XL Recordings.
DISCUSSION 2: Pitchfork’s People’s List
I’ll go into several parts of the poll I found pretty interesting (And if I start going on a tirade, I apologize):
Kid A Vs. OK Computer
This is the first thing that sticks out, mainly because everyone knew it would happen. Of course the #1 was going to be a Radiohead album. The question was this: Which Radiohead album would it be. Kid A and OK Computer received about equal praise from critics at their release, both top all time lists to this day, and both received 10s from Pitchfork. I personally believe that OK Computer isthe better album, by a long shot. While many may not share my belief in that Kid A is not much special (Innovative? Sure. Amazing to listen to? Not really.), they probably agree with me that OK Computer is simply an easier listen, and not as hard to listen to. OK Computer’s greatness is kind of plain and easy to see, even if you’re just casually listening to it. Kid A takes a lot of looking into to appreciate. Of course, the two albums are both 1 and 2, so the belief in this fact can’t be that drastic.
Kanye & Radiohead on equal terms
I didn’t do much more than skim the top 200, and I went right to the stats at the bottom to find some interesting graphs and figures. The one that stuck out was this: “Kanye and Radiohead had 5 each. No artist had more than 5”. I’m sure this is odd to some people, but it makes a lot of sense. Pitchfork (And music fans in general) tend to like artists that change it up from album to album. Just look at Radiohead and Animal Collective. Kanye does the exact same thing. The College Dropout had his old-school soul samples in the forefront. Late Registration had more orchestral elements to it. Graduation was his venture into electronic, dark sounds. 808s & Heartbreaks was an auto-tuned, not really Hip-Hop album. And My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was a perfect combination of everything he’d done up to this point. In a way, he did exactly what Radiohead did, but was more consistent about it. So of course he had an equal amount of ablums to them.
Really? That High?
A lot of the list makes sense, but some of it doesn’t. The top 10 has has two instances of this with This is It and Illinois. Of course, maybe I’m just too hard on This is It (I’m not the biggest Strokes fan), but I never really hear people rant and rave about how great This is It is. I hear that discussion go on with most of the rest of the top 10, but not really about This is It. Then Illinois is number 10! My initial reaction was “That’s cool!” because it’s a great album, and Pitchfork loved it, but in a similar case to This is It, it’s not an album I hear people ranting and raving about all the time.
Also, James Blake ranking in the 70s just goes to prove I’m not the only person who loved the hell out of that album. Plus Justin Timberlake even making the list just affirms that Futuresex/Lovesounds is a great album.
Really? That Low?
Alright, here’s where a bit of anger comes in. The most glaring “Why so low?” comes around 189 when Lift Yr Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven appeared. What!?! Godspeed You, Black Emperor! were Headliners at Pitchfork. What sense does it make that they’re so damn low? I know the album wasn’t the highest on my ballot, but I still love the album. Why didn’t other people?
Another glaring problem I had was that Sufjan Steven’s The Age of Adz was ranked below Michigan. Which I think indicates that most people like Old Sufjan more than new Sufjan. But why does new Sufjan get all the hate? Age of Adz is easily a more well thought out, better album than Michigan. So, yeah.
Odd Notes About That Map Breakdown
Some peculiar things stuck out with the map. A) In some cities, Kid A got its ass handed to it by Funeral and In An Aeroplane Over the Sea. B) OK Computer was #1 in every city. C) EXCEPT Houston, the only city where Funeral was #1, and Kid A outranked OK Computer. (Only in Texas…)
Brooklyn Dominating City-Based Artists
…Of course it does…
2007 and 2010 Were Great Years for Music
Hell yeah they were!
The Perfect Reasoning For Making Sound of Silver Your Greatest Album of the Past 15 Years
“When your two favorite songs of all time (Someone Great and All My Friends) are back to back on the same album, it’s an easy choice for favorite album of all time”
-Patrick Maury: The Man
If you want to browse the list for yourself and find something to get angry about/ find interesting, go here.
Do you generally agree with this list? Do you disagree with it? What is the best album since 1996? Does this list matter? Did you vote? What was your ballot like? Is Kid A a better album (It isn’t)? And what should we discuss…next?
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