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The silver lining in 2020: My favorite albums of the year.
In any subject, cultural representation, art form, or even place, writing a retrospective article of the year will inevitably share whatever focus it has with one thing: the global pandemic. The relentless nature of the COVID-19 changed our ways of dealing with social issues, judge our governments and institutions, and our actual lives. The virus…
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The Ascension by Sufjan Stevens – Review
Despite releasing proper LP’s every 5 years since 2005, Sufjan Stevens never stops. He puts out many music in the period between albums, and the last five years weren’t the exception. This fact makes you wonder how he creates a piece of work as coherent and accomplished as his past records, while working in many…
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Shore by Fleet Foxes – Review
Although relating the music of an artist directly to a particular season would greatly undermine its inherent value, there’s no denying that there are songs and albums that can be enjoyed differently whether it’s hot or cold outside. There’s a reason summer playlists exist. Fleet Foxes for me have always been a perfect fall/winter season…
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Kid A by Radiohead – Essentiality Review
Succintly is not a way someone could describe Radiohead’s career; one of the most succesful and well-renowned bands of the 21st century. Trying to do it with Kid A certainly isn’t an easy task either. Anyway, I’ll try: The fourth album of the Oxford quintet is the one left-turn of an already beloved rock band…
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Kid-ays: ‘It’s not like the movies…’
‘Motion Picture Soundtrack’ is an ending song. The track sends-off Kid A with quite the opposite of a bang, however it is still quite a grand finale with its mellow organs, awe-inspiring harps and overall sorrowful atmosphere. The song is inherently sad but it’s a different kind of deep and beating emotion. The one that…
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Kid-ays: ‘Everybody wants to be a friend…’
‘Morning Bell’ has a unique place in Kid A. Coming just after the most recognizable track in the album and before the sweeping closer. It is also the only song that was presented in a different form in Amnesiac, an album composed mostly of Kid A‘s outtakes despite being released as its successor. The song…
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Kid-ays: ‘Throw it in the fire…’
If there’s a clear meaning for the definitive composition of Kid A is: utter paranoia. ‘Idioteque’ is the quintessential track of the album. A song that fully embraces the beat-driven, synth drenched electronics and also dwells in the fear-inducing realities in our war-leaning and technology-flooding world. The paradox here is that Thom Yorke’s voice is…
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Gold Record by Bill Callahan – Review
Few solo music careers go back 30 years. In any other context, this would’ve been a remarkable feat, but in 2020 it reaches god-like proportions. Who would actually have the energy, after 20 albums released, to keep making music at the twilight of a decade filled with social turmoil and a year that has strengthen…
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Kid-ays: ‘This beautiful world…’
‘In Limbo’ despite being sonically wider, sounds more like an interlude than ‘Treefingers’. It treads the same territory that ‘Faust Arp’ would, 7 years later on ‘In Rainbows’. That specific trait may have something to do with the fact that the song lands between the two most recognized songs in Kid A. I once read…
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Kid-ays: ‘Float around on a prison ship…’
After a compelling start, Kid A reaches a more straightforward approach in the middle. That’s not to say it gets boring, quite the opposite, the next two songs check even more boxes when it come to adding sounds to the album. However they way they do it is uniquely simple. ‘Treefingers’ is the outlier amongst…
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Kid-ays: ‘The moment’s already past…’
Radiohead is a band known for their ability to successfully strive for beauty. When they commit themselves to craft a song that is blatantly gorgeous it is rare that they fail. In Kid A, earlier in the album than you might expect, comes ‘How to Disappear Completely’ one of the quintet’s most poignant exemplars of…
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Kid-ays: ‘Everyone has got the fear…’
‘The National Anthem’ is one song that proves that Radiohead can, even among a dystopian collection of electronic drenched tracks, get funky. And it’s still chillingly alienated funk. The song’s opening bassline is one of the most recognizable intros of any song from the band and even more so its disruptive addition of a brass…
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Kid-ays: ‘I slipped on a little white lie’.
After all these years what makes Kid A stand out from Radiohead’s discography it’s the moments in it that haven’t become widely renowned by their faithful fan-base and the general alternative listeners. Songs like ‘Everything In Its Right Place’, ‘Idioteque’ and ‘The National Anthem’ are today, quintessentially Radiohead. ‘Kid A’ in the other hand it’s…
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Kid-Ays: ‘What is that you tried to say?’
In the first year of this blog, Radiohead’s Ok Computer celebrated its 20th year of existence and I made a major feature in which I wrote a song-by-song review every Friday up to the anniversary of its release, which landed on a Friday, (Editor’s note: ‘On a Friday’ is the original name of Radiohead. Funny,…
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Canción Animal by Soda Stereo – Essentiality Review
“Oh, so you DO like music in Spanish?“ I definitely would expect my readers to ask that question. Also some skeptics certainly would claim that writing about one of the most famous albums of Latin rock, by one of the most recognized Latin American bands isn’t actually commendable when it comes to show interest for…