oh my god, I LOVE IT!

RZR said:

cool avvie!

The early reviews are in, and Volta currently stands at a 75 at metacrtic.

Moonbeam said:

So did you listen yet?

GangstaFam said:

It's been delayed a week!

Moonbeam said:

Are you sure? Have you tried lots of stores?

GangstaFam said:

Yeah- Borders, Sanity, HMV and JB Hi-Fi. I'm going to check again today anyway.

Moonbeam said:

Try some of the weird indie stores like Egg and over that direction. Call around. Someone's gotta have it!

GangstaFam said:

I will. It's pissing me right off!

Moonbeam said:

I was afraid that maybe you bought it, didn't like it and that's why you weren't saying anything.

HAPPY VOLTA DAY!!!

(for all us U.S. djörks, anyway - happy belated to all else! )

Anx said:

IstenSzek said:

it was inevitable, really, wasn't it?

Anx said:

haha it was. it actually took me 4 or 5 seconds to realise
it wasn't the original cover

Anx said:

If you live in Chicago, go to "Groovin' High Records" On Belmont- they're giving away really cool Volta posters with each purchase!

eleven said:

is that the place between clark and southport? i've never been in that place...though i knew if there was a special to be found, you'd sniff it out!

YAY i have my copy

YAY i got a poster (the downtown reckless records location in chicago has 'em!)

BOO i hate the packaging!

what's up with this musicology package design shit?!?

the photos are pretty and i like the colors.

the sticker seal: LAME (include it as a peel-off INSIDE the album, ugh)

the pocket for the liner notes booklet: LAME (way too tight and unwieldy)

listen to me complain. i'll be waddling up to the counter like a little bitch in a couple weeks, drooling for the special edition version.

Anx said:

Post your review, son!

GangstaFam said:

it is elsewherefully located.

Anx said:

Bjork sticky says she needs it.

GangstaFam said:

FINE!

via rym.com
http://rateyourmusic.com/...jork/volta

^

thanks!

Anx said:

truer words have never been spoken.

Anx said:

I was just seconds away from asking you what you thought of it now. Guess that answers it!

anyone get the 5.1 surround version?

Surprising review from them. I can see their point, even if I like it much more than they do.

http://www.pitchforkmedia...2768-volta


Björk
Volta
[Atlantic; 2007]
Rating: 5.8




If you wanted to find the last time Björk really let her hair down on a record, you'd have to look all the way back to 1995's Post. From "Army of Me" (its video found her driving a tank and wearing gold teeth) to "It's Oh So Quiet" to "I Miss You", that record sired some of the most vibrant songs of her career. It's a side of her we've only caught in brief glimpses ever since. In the course of moving back to Iceland after a letter bomb scare in 1997, engaging in psychological warfare with Lars Von Trier on the set of 2000's oppressively bleak Dancer in the Dark, falling in love with Matthew Barney in 2001, giving birth to her second child in 2002, and of course, just getting older, Björk's output has become increasingly austere and inward-looking. The unhinged, mischievous screamers that were once her calling card are now mostly a thing of the past, replaced by songs that more closely resemble holy moments than sing-alongs.

But in her pre-game interviews for Volta, Björk hinted that it might finally be time to flip the switch back. "All I wanted for this album was to have fun and do something that was full-bodied and really up," she told Pitchfork-- one of a handful of interviews to feature descriptors like "fun" and "poppy" and "accessible." Disappointingly, it turns out that Timbaland and the Technicolor artwork were red herrings-- Volta is not Björk's pop record. Figuring out what it is, actually, is a much more difficult task; where even her most divisive albums have managed to push her artistic boundaries, Volta feels limp and strangely empty-- almost unfinished.

Its emptiness is doubly disappointing when considering the caliber of guest performers involved. In addition to Timbaland, Volta features Antony Hegarty (of & the Johnsons fame), improv drummer Chris Corsano, Lightning Bolt drummer Brian Chippendale, Konono No. 1, Malian kora player Toumani Diabate, Chinese pipa player Min Xiao-Fen, and a 10-piece Icelandic brass band. Some of that guestlist goes wasted; Chippendale is banished to slow-build purgatory on the brooding Antony duet "The Dull Flame of Desire", while Konono No. 1 are reduced to fighting for space with 37 other elements in the already overstuffed "Earth Intruders". Even Timbaland's contributions feel oddly apathetic; aside from "Earth Intruders", which pales in comparison to any Timbaland/Björk collaboration you'd hear in your head, neither of his other productions bear much of his imprint at all. With its distorted, squelching rhythms, "Innocence" sounds, ironically, more like the work of longtime collaborator Mark Bell, and "Hope"s scampering percussion and spindly kora lines, while interesting, are marred by an atrocious lyric about terrorism: "What's the lesser of two evils?/ If a suicide bomber made to look pregnant/ Manages to kill her target or not?"

For a record ostensibly about tribalism and reconnecting with our animal sides, much of Volta plods. Insulated with samples of running water, long, mournful horns, and gently plucked pipa, "I See Who You Are" is a tranquil lullaby without much of a melody at all. "Vertebrae by Vertebrae" rests on a looped horn sample not far from Peter Thomas' "Bolero on the Moon Rocks" (sampled by Pulp on "This Is Hardcore"), but Björk can't take it anywhere, instead filling its five minutes with runs from her catalog of preferred vocal shorthand scribbles. On the heels of those two songs, the rhythmless "Pneumonia"-- which finds Björk utterly adrift melodically-- is an even harder sell.

There are, of course, a handful of lovely parts as well. While I have problems with the way "Earth Intruders" sounds-- muddy, clunky, overcompressed, and not nearly as aerodynamic as you'd expect a Björk/Timbaland track to sound-- its charm comes through with time. With lyrics pulled from a Russian poem made popular by Andrei Tarkovsky's Stalker (how's that for pop!) and regal, curling horns reminiscent of the crescendoing strings in Henryk Gorecki's 3rd Symphony (uh, ditto), the 7½-minute Björk/Antony duet "The Dull Flame of Desire" is a darkly elegant setpiece that beautifully showcases both voices. Ultimately, though, it's the industrial jackhammering of "Declare Independence" that steals the show. Built around a wriggling synth lead, some brash EQing, and white-hot swaths of digital noise, it's a gloriously messy few minutes-- one of her most transcendent tracks to date.

In the end, though, those golden moments are too few and far between, and the slow, unfurling, lingering moments too long. If the critical and fan response to this album reflects that of the fascinatingly eccentric (but largely maligned) Medúlla, I'll be curious to see how she responds. Until then, Volta is mostly proof that Björk is as fallible as the messy, unpredictable humanity she celebrates, and that even her definition of "pop" is avant-garde.

-Mark Pytlik, May 08, 2007

RZR said:

oh gee. pitchfork didn't like a pop-alternative icon's new record. what a shock.

these days, if pitchfork gives an album a bad review, it's like a thumbs-up for me. they really need to look into staff colonics or something.

Anx said:

That part didn't surpise me. What surprised me is how much exposure they gave it over the last several months, and then this. LOL.

RZR said:

well, they do have a music news site to run and ad space to sell and a festival to promote. they can't afford to be TOTAL pricks.

RZR said:

Will that be released in the U.S.?