Blige, as always, does her damnedest to sell every clichéd platitude and mixed metaphor.
I Dreamed a Dream doesn’t provide any insight into Boyle beyond what has already been widely reported in the media.
With just a few exceptions, it isn’t hard to hear why these tracks were relegated to B-sides.
The album arrives stateside unburdened by any expectations for an artistic or commercial rebound.
The album impresses all the more as the rare Idol debut to sound like the work of an actual artist with a clear sense of purpose.
What’s most puzzling and disappointing about Battle Studies is that its banality seems like a deliberate choice.
This is exactly the kind of pleasant and ultimately forgettable album that most of Kris Allen’s Idol performances predicted he would make.
The album is about as edgy as recent albums by Aimee Mann and Rosanne Cash.
Escovedo’s critical cachet has always outstripped his name recognition and commercial impact.
The Old 97’s have been drawing from the best of country, rock, and pop all along.
For the unconverted, it’s hard to hear the album as anything more than inessential.
In Love & War is deserving of greater commercial impact than it is likely to earn.
A little restraint works in Carrie Underwood’s favor.
This isn’t simply a for-fans-only vanity project or an excuse to revisit an album that’s just over a year old.
Electric Six don’t stray far from their trademark brand of groove-heavy, ironic cock rock on Kill.
That each of the principal characters has been fully drawn over the course of the show’s run gives context to even the most absurd story.
There simply isn’t a weak song on the record, and Nichols hits every mark in his vocal performances.
It’s tempting to say that the structural sloppiness of the fourth season of Showtime’s Dexter is a deliberate bit of auto-critique.
Survivor is really starting to show its age.
It’s the enthusiasm of the performances that makes Mind Chaos work, but the fact that it’s always dialed up so high also works against the album.