Customer Reviews

Smile...It Confuses People

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

After hearing "I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker With Flowers In My Hair," I was really looking forward to hearing the rest of Sandi Thom's repertoire. Unfortunately, the album is filled with whiny songs and marginal-at-best vocal performance. I tried hard to like it, but... it just isn't very good.

There are several ways to download free music, and legally too. Always fearful of an FBI crackdown on illegal downloaders, I prefer to get my music through conventional channels. This summer that meant downloading weekly music samplers (twenty-fives songs with a common genre) from Facebook's Apple Students group. It was in one of these piles that I first `sampled' Sandi Thom.

Alexandria Thom (Sandi for short) was born and raised in Scotland. After finishing high school and a stint with a cover band, Thom auditioned and was accepted to The Institute of Performing Arts in Liverpool. After leaving The Institute, Thom made her way back to Scotland where she was contacted by an independent record label. Since then, Thom has moved on to a bigger company and completed her first solo album: Smile . . . It Confuses People.

The album reached number one in the United Kingdom and has now made its way to the United States. You may be familiar with her popular single "I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker (With Flowers in My Hair)" which reached the top of UK singles charts and was available via Facebook this summer.
On a very superficial level, the CD title is great because it is so true.

The title also sums up the attitude of the album--upbeat. The folk music elements and the quick tempo in Thom's songs add to the optimistic feel. In other words, this album is perfect if you are having a good day and want to keep the good mood going, or a bad day that desperately needs a switch.

The most important thing, though, is that the songs have substance. The music is resonant, Thom's vocals are wonderful to hear, and the lyrics linger. There is more to these songs than just the catchy pop tune to sing along with on the radio.

"When Horsepower Meant What It Said" opens the album with a nostalgia for the days when life wasn't quite so tame. The song's chorus bemoans, "how hard the path is trodden" nowadays. Then, of course, there's "I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker" in which Thom sings about the trajedy of being born too late to be a rocker of the sixties or seventies. This song is fun, with claps keeping the beat throughout, but it also really speaks to the listener. Who hasn't wanted to be a punk rocker?

The real powerhouse of the album is though is "Lonely Girl." This is the only song on the CD that Thom did not write in collaboration. Basically, it has everything that a good song needs: it tells a story, which makes it great for ballad-lovers, while the music, which features a piano and violin, seems reminiscent of jazz. Meanwhile the lyrics read like a poem: "I sometimes see her down by the river / the water dances on her skin / and she can captivate you with her eyes / but she will never let you in." Like many of Thom's songs, this one is tinged with a sense of wistfulness for that which is lost, or maybe for something she never had.

The songs alter between this theme of nostalgia and musings on doubt, as with "What If I'm Right" where Thom wonders if a relationship is too good to be true. Throughout the album an undercurrent of fun and optimism is still maintained. If you don't smile after hearing "The Human Jukebox" you have no sense of humor.

"Time", the song that could be a pseudo-biography for Thom, rounds out this excellent debut which is strikingly apt for college students as they move on to the next chapter of their lives when, "it's time to work and not time to play."

Smile . . . It Confuses People is a truly multivalent album that can give you almost anything you need. Whether it's good music, meaningful lyrics or catchy tune that you're looking for...this one's got it all.

Wow, what an absolutely cool story and what a refreshing album. I came across Sandi's stuff via social networking and backed my way into her story. Great stuff with great lyrics, Sandi's style reminds me a bit of Sheryl Crow's second album. Her voice has that plaintive soaring quality combined with a raw edge that reminds me, at times, of Janis Joplin.

Check out these lyrics. . . . "Oh I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair, When music really mattered and when radio was king, When accountants didn't have control and the media couldn't buy your soul." Wow, good stuff. . . .

From the mellow "Sunset Borderline" to the uptempo "When Horsepower Meant What It Said", you'll find this stuff to be compelling and cool. And on a personal aside, here's to artists who can take the initiative to outfox the existing media outlets. I'm sick to death of the overproduced music spewing from the same music making machine in quick succession, aren't you? Enjoy!

Sandi Thom has a compelling voice that makes you listen... and then you find out she's having fun. The whole point of a song like, "I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair" is ironic - punk rockers don't have flowers in their hair, do they? But she's looking back at '69 and '77 and a time when she sees the world as being a little simpler place, one that meant a little more fun and community than now - "when computers still were scary and we didn't know everything." Amen!

"What if I'm right" is another great song - all in all throughout this album she brings great energy and intensity to her songs... thoroughly enjoyable, good music, and a lovely lass to boot. If you like the music, that's the important point. To turn on it because you think she's over-marketed or had false beginnings... was she good enough to get to where she is? I think so. She knocked off Gnarls Barkley in England, and that's no mean feat.

One last note... in the UK, apparently "was" is correct; were is the US conditional. Two countries separated by a common language!

Can't really understand what's not to like here. If you're looking for a female singer-songwriter with little substance or quality, look elsewhere. This is music, and it's great music. Not every song is catchy or upbeat, but that's what makes great songwriting: the ability to do different things in music with both tone of music and with lyrics. Sandi has both the chops and the sound to be a hit, should that be her destiny. If not, her music will still resonate with listeners for years to come. Great tracks on this album include (but definitely are not limited to) Time, Lonely Girl, Castles, and Superman. Some songs are of a more folk variety, some an rock-country-alternative, but all are great. Don't read into the negative reviews. I've not talked to anyone who's heard her music (I host a radio show and get losts of feedback from listeners) that hasn't enjoyed it.

I first heard "What If I'm Right" when I was in England last year -- Sandi Thom was on some talk show, promoting her first single. I loved the song, and was sort of delightfully surprised to see that she looked totally freaked out -- her performance was stellar but she was socially awkward with the interviewer. And it was kinda nice.

But I'm disturbed to see that this Amazon page still has the "story" of her rise up in the Product Description section. I think that story has been well debunked by now. There's even a guy in England who claims that the PR company stole his story, and used it to promote Thom instead.

Does it change the music? Not really. The songs are still catchy. But if you care about things like where your coffee comes from, and where your flowers come from, it's worth a Google. I still listen to this CD, but when I hear it, I see Thom as a little more Britney Spears, rather than as the Alanis Morrisette-type she was set up to be.

Okay. Iwas flipping through channels and I saw the video for "I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker", I'm telling I loooooooooooooooove her voice. She's got a great career ahead of ehr. YOu jsut listen to her and she makes you wanna free yourself and just shut up and have fun. I love you, Sandi. I'm so buying this album.

A pretty nice pop debut album from the Scottish Sandi Thom. Wasn't really familiar with her til I was looking through a KT Tunstall playlist and a related search popped up titled "Sandi Thom" so one click away began my journey of buying this (for a penny, a cheap bargain) and listening to the whole album. I'd have to admit, though, that constant listening to this will drive you a little off the wall (maybe due to the whining...) but there are some gems in here: "When Horsepower Meant What it Said", very beat-driven, "I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker", cleverly written & catchy, "Lonely Girl", a slow story-ballad, "Time". Those are my favorites, anyway. Give her a try.

Apparantly I live under a rock because this album and singer who I had never ever even heard of has made a fairly big splash in the UK. First let me say I bought this at Tower for like $2 and only bought it cause 1. It's cheap 2. The Album cover boasted "The UK #1 album including the UK #1 single "I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker (With Flowers In My Hair) and 3. Umm did you just read the title of that single? So I bought it and listened to it and was only a tad impressed.

This Sandi is a good enough singer but the single is nothing like I expected and had she written just a tad bit more clever lyrics perhaps that song could've saved the album for me. Instead it's almost the worst song on the album.

She does a lot better on more poppy ballad type of things like "Lonely Girl" and "Sunset Borderline." After listening to the whole album, it occured to me that upon repeat listenings I learn to like it a bit more but right now it's just doing it for me.

ok its a great cd and it has some meaningful song on it which has touch me in different ways than i thought the song make me think of my past future and now and im enjoying every song thats on the cd