Customer Reviews

Fake Can Be Just As Good

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Funny, a lot of people are warning new listeners away from this album...but this is where I started -- and I would describe myself as a serious fan (of all their work). Starting someone out on "Certain Damaged Lemons" may be a surefire way of producing another convert, but they'd be a little misled about where the band's sound is coming from if they were compelled to dig into the back catalog.

"Fake" is a cusp where the band began moving towards the textural brilliance of later recordings. Yet it's still possessed of the scintillating no-wave-ish guitar that characterized their initial recordings.

Maybe I love it for partially nostalgic reasons, but even when I revisit it in search of faults it rocks my socks off!

Although "In an expression..." probably got better reviews, I feel this is the best Blonde Redhead album. I own every album they have released so far and this is the most beautiful and complex of their albums. Every track on here is beautiful. I would say "futurism vs. passeism" is my favorite on this album. "futurism vs. passeism pt. 2" can be found on "in an expression...". I had the wonderful pleasure of seeing this band live in houston just recently.i have even a better love and respect for "kazuality" and "water" after seeing them perform these tracks live. check this album out and there self titled release for the best sampling of blonde redhead.

A few years ago, before I knew that BR had released earlier albums that sounded a lot like Sonic Youth, (which is not a bad thing) I saw that BR was coming to Boise. Fake had just come out, so I bought the CD a couple days before the concert. I became an instant fan and their concert was as good as the album. While I like all of their albums, this one is so unique that I really have nothing to compare it to. It is easily one of my favorite indie rock albums.

i dont follow the band i just listen to the albums. i'm told they resemble sonic youth, but they are distinguished to me. my favorites are probably the two earliest i'm aware of: (self-titled) and mia vita violenta, the second being the best, and one of my favorite alltime albums. but this album has grown on me. it is much less improvisational than the other two named. i consider it to be a semi-conceptual album, and thus contrived. it is a much more routine sound than the earlier ones, but still less over-produced than later albums. the songs are very catchy, as well as synthetic and repetitive. i think it is their first album to demonstrate such a synthetic vibe, but it still seems to evolve naturally from their previous music. very listenable guitar driven music, with something to say, inspite of its shallowness.

I'm reviewing to add that this album is excellent, though it was a sleeper for me, having it for a month before I could even try listening to it a second time. The last BR album I had bought before this was "Mia Vita Violenta..." which I liked pretty much instantaneously. I guess that means that the two albums are pretty different. This album has a fairly consistent tone and sound, much like their first album. Feedback, distortion and jangled melodies give rise to Sonic Youth comparisons. (In fact one song has a chord progression that sounds just like a SY song, though I can never figure out which song.) The thing I like the best about this album is that it's packed with raw agression and energy and doesn't loosen its grip. If you like that, then I HIGHLY suggest PJ Harvey's Rid of Me, which sounds a bit like an ambush by rocket launcher.

i dont like to get subjective...

objectively, its not the best mixdown and i feel that the individual volume in some tracks is higher or lower. despite that, it rules in a very objective way

3 1/2

The jagged beauty exuded in earlier work is on full display here, applying a Sonic Youth-like dissonance they are so often accused of stealing, but molding it into more grooving, less-consciously battering and anti- for the sake of it, forms.

Picking up where Sonic Youth left off, Blonde Redhead craft a turbulent blend of noise and pop on their third album. Composed of two Italian brothers and a female Japanese guitarist/vocalist, Blonde Redhead use alternating female/male vocals to great effect. Only slightly noisier than their previous release, "La Mia Vita Violenta". A must for fans of modern noise-pop.

Least lovely, least exceptional, least consistent, just least solid all around. Even at the peak of my BR obsession, I rarely listened to this album all the way through. My guesstimate is that after their first two more Sonic Youth-y albums the band was deliberately trying to change their sound, to move their unique song structures closer to something a little more rocking. Note the guest addition of Vern Rumsey from Unwound on this album. The album is more aggressive than the earlier two, but doesn't seem to go far enough. (After this album BR seem to more actively embrace the pop element and tweak their sound around that center, to wonderful effect.) But despite all my gripes, I must concede that there are some fantastic moments on this album - specifically the amazing "Symphony of Treble," which is still one of their best songs and which could be reason enough to snatch this disc up. But trust me, get everything else BR put out first.

is this title in reference to all the Sonic Youth comparisons the band must receive on a daily basis? Blonde Redhead have never really made me crazy. they have some good songs and some good ideas. but i can't shake the obvious copycat syndrome. it's like, who is better...AC/DC or Rhino Bucket? know what i mean?
but...this cd is okay. the layout and design be hideous stank rotten, though. next...