The Album Review Club - Week #120 - (page 1413) - The Lexicon of Love - ABC

RobMCFC said:
All,

A quick straw poll: as this is the last album of round #3, and I’m off to Spain this weekend, I was thinking of having a 2-week break before we kick off the next round.

However, if people want to go straight onto round #4, it will be my next nomination running over 2 weeks.

What we do will be based on any feedback in the next 24 hours.

Thanks.
Click to expand...

I think 'd prefer to have your next offering for two week rather than nothing.
 
Pat Metheny - From This Place.

As mentioned previously - those least few mins of America Undefined is Music perfection - Would suit a Batman film, with him looking over Gotham on fire on something. Very cinematic.

Unfortunately rest of the Album doesn’t grab me at all and kind of washes past, which is a shame as I know technically it’s great and very well produced

I like the fact this isn’t your normal Jazz Album and there’s plenty of strings and other instrumental sections that differ - ‘From This Place’ was a welcome break with its nice vocals

The rest is just background dinner music for me.

Nice pick just really not my genre

4/10
 
OK, the people have spoken. here are your dates for round #4.

Notes
1. The first nomination will run for two weeks.
2. The nomination list is everybody who nominated in this round, plus denislawsbackheel (who requested to drop out for the last round).
3. The order is the same as last round, with denislawsbackheel moving up the list because he missed out last time.

Any problems with the dates, just let me know and we'll swap them around.

Any new members wishing to rejoin or old members wishing to rejoin, just get involved with the weekly reviews and I'll add you to the list.

25/08/2022 RobMCFC
08/09/2022 @FogBlueInSanFran
15/09/2022 @BlueHammer85
22/09/2022 @Saddleworth2
29/09/2022 @OB1
06/10/2022 @denislawsbackheel
13/10/2022 @KnaresboroughBlue
20/10/2022 @BimboBob
27/10/2022 @journolud
03/11/2022 @bennyboy
10/11/2022 @Mancitydoogle
17/11/2022 @GoatersLeftShin
24/11/2022 @Coatigan
01/12/2022 @southamptonblue
08/12/2022 @Bill Walker
 
I hate to use the term nice background music, but that is about where I am with this one. A couple good songs that actually hold my attention and drag me in, the rest I can happily have on but also easily forget is on. Indulgent, yes, and so it should be. Lengthy, no issue with that either. Some good interaction with other instruments. Didn't feel the guitar, which is often the dominant bit, did much other than endless mincing, and I would have liked a bit more intensity and getting carried away with it. Clearly though, a lot of skill on show both as individual musicians and how it is all put together.

As an album itself, probably a 5. As a nomination that challenges the norm and for the sheer guts to nominate it, giving it a solid 7.
 
I feel badly, as I encouraged Bill to nominate some jazz, but I guess this isn’t really what I had in mind. I was thinking darker, more bluesy, with sprightlier brass and less guitar up front (though I mean it’s Pat Metheny, what should I have expected, right?) Songform and structure has place in jazz like it does a lot of music, but here I feel like themes are lost in a sea of aimless noodling, as good as the noodling can be (dig the piano in the opener, or the harmonica on The Past In Us for example, or the guitar on Everything Explained). This takes sound-not-songs to a whole new level. That there are putative lyrics on From This Place come as almost a jarring shock. There were certainly parts I enjoyed — I agree with those who thought sections of America Undefined were a bit special — but as an addition to doing something else (mostly working). As sheer aural pleasure, I found this exceedingly difficult to concentrate on. Maybe it’s just because my brain expects to return to a chord or a chorus I enjoy but with this music we basically never do. It’s always going somewhere different and new and unexpected, which is great in concept, but the problem is it’s also fucking exhausting, which isn’t the effect I assume jazz artists are going for. Maybe this music just tries to use that 90% of the brain humans never use so I am out of practice. Anyhow, I can’t claim I can’t rate this unlike opera, but I have to go 3/10 because I had no visceral connection here on any level, but can appreciate talented musicians, even when not playing hooks. Maybe I’m not limber enough to appreciate this on the whole, though I’m glad I tried — stretching is always good. Also as I said before — megaprops for the album cover; I wish the music had lived up.
 
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