|
| Headline | Rolling Stone Review of "Surprise" |
|
Page:
[1] |
| Author | Comment |
Sumit
May-03-2006, 01:49 GMT
IP:
Australia
 | Six years ago -- after more than a decade of conceptual forays into South African mbqanga, Brazilian folk music and show tunes -- Paul Simon released You´re The One, a pretty, relatively straight singer-songwriter album spiked with doses of jazzy patter and modest orchestrations. Surprise plays like a sister record to You´re the One, with one key difference: production help from Brian Eno, who pioneered ambient rock in the Seventies before twiddling knobs for U2 and Talking Heads.
Eno outfits some of Simon´s most elegant songs yet with spacey accouterments, ranging from the shimmery atmospherics of "That´s Me" to the buzzy electro-folk groove of "Another Galaxy." Despite the album´s shiny surface, Simon sounds like Simon. Over the spry percussion and electronics-specked Bo Diddley groove of "Sure Don´t Feel Like Love," he drops self-conscious barbs with the same pained wiseass spirit that made him poet laureate of New York alienation in the early Seventies. Much of the time, though, he sticks to tender ruminations on time and tide, pledging eternal love to his little girl on "Fathers and Daughters" and working up a gospel-tinged elegy for conflict-ravaged families on "Wartime Prayers."
Surprise´s mellow introspection ends up just being sleepy on slow burners like "I Don´t Believe." But "Outrageous" slides easily between hard-edged and pretty, with Simon dissing big corporations in the voice of an aging striver who does "900 sit-ups a day," then asking, "Who´s gonna love you when your looks are gone?" The answer: God, whom Simon praises over a sparkling pastoral groove that almost keeps you from wishing the Eno-Simon collaboration had happened thirty years ago.
|
| | |
Sumit
May-03-2006, 01:51 GMT
IP:
Australia
| 3.5 stars.
Don´t agree with many of the comments.
|
| | |
sdldawn
May-03-2006, 02:13 GMT
IP:
USA - United Staates America
 | don´t agree with it at all..
that promo got in the wrong reviewers hands obviously...
he focused more on past comparisons than anything on the new album |
| | |
Sumit
May-03-2006, 02:23 GMT
IP:
Australia
| Completely right. Very smug review. Sister album to YTO? Whatever! |
| | |
sdldawn
May-03-2006, 03:41 GMT
IP:
USA - United Staates America
| Thats a terrible comparison.. due to the fact that musically, and lyrically its too diverse albums..
I honestly don´t think they even listened to either albums.. ha |
| | |
Nathgertsch
May-03-2006, 08:05 GMT
IP:
France
 | We cant´ really judge : compared to this journalist, we haven´t heard the whole album yet... |
| | |
Søren
May-03-2006, 13:24 GMT
IP:
Denmark
 | Well, Nath, I think a lot of us HAVE heard it all by now. As mentioned in another thread the album has been leaked and can now quite easily be found "out there".
I do agree with one thing in the RS review. Paul Simon still sounds like himself. That is, despite of the very unusual "new" sound there is still that destinct Simon sound to it, especially in his singing style. And that´s a (very) good thing!
Still, this album IS very different (at least from what I expected in a new Paul Simon album), and therefore I think it might take a few more listens than usual before we can judge it. Personally I haven´t heard the other tracks than the four previewed ones (which IMO spands from good to great) enough yet, to really know which ones I will like best.
For now I CAN say however that "Another Galaxy" certainly could be a favourite, so there I agree with what sdldawn writes in another thread.
Well, I think I will stop here. Some of you might prefer to wait with all this talk before the official release ;-)
I still look very much forward to recieving my preordered album, though. Call me oldfassioned, but it´s not really an album before you have held it in your hands :-) |
| | |
Jeroen
May-03-2006, 14:47 GMT
IP:
Netherlands
 | I heard the whole album and I Love it. I think it easily surpasses the YTO album. Write down the lyrics and see what he has to say in these new songs. He doesn´t need to write hit songs anymore, so hooks and catchy choruses are characteristically absent. So maybe it´s predominantly art to be enjoyed by the industrious few;) |
| | |
Matthew Evans
May-03-2006, 15:25 GMT
IP:
United Kingdom
 | Soren I can´t find it anywhere!? :( |
| | |
Søren
May-03-2006, 15:35 GMT
IP:
Denmark
| Hm... I have seen it on both amule and limewire. I got it via a torrent stream. On isohunt.com search for "Paul Simon Surprise" and take the torrent with most seeders. Of course you need a bittorrent client to get it this way, but I think it´s the fastest. If you are not familiar with torrents, I´m sure you can find an FAQ somewhere that will explain it much better than I. Or you could just try Limewire, which is probably the easiest way. |
| | |
Matthew Evans
May-03-2006, 16:06 GMT
IP:
United Kingdom
| Cheers Soren, I´ve got it now, much appreciated ;) |
| | |
Søren
May-03-2006, 16:19 GMT
IP:
Denmark
| You are very welcome, glad I could help. |
| | |
Matthew Evans
May-03-2006, 17:47 GMT
IP:
United Kingdom
| I Love it, I like all of the songs (not too sure about everything about it...)
"Wartime Prayers" is great, as is "Another Galaxy" but my favourite is "I Don´t Believe"
Edie´s chestnut hair, that section which sounds a bit like Santero from the Capeman and the "as if life was a whim" lyric. :-) |
| | |
Bodo
May-03-2006, 17:58 GMT
IP:
Austria
 | Another Galaxy is really one of the best songs |
| | |
Micky
May-03-2006, 23:30 GMT
IP:
USA - United Staates America
| Smug doesn´t come into it here. YTO got 4 and they give this one 3.5 for goodness sake. I haven´t heard the full album yet, but what I have heard I Love. Warime prayers is just an amazing somg.
Oh well, we know better anyway. Reviews like that I wouldn´t line the cat litter tray with frankly...lol |
| | |
|
Page:
[1]
|