Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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21 of 26 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
THE BEST ALBUM OF THE LAST TEN YEARS - LET ME TELL YOU WHY., November 2, 2000
Usually, I'd let the music of this masterpiece live up the title I just bestowed on it, but I'll do my best here.This second LP shows a fully realized body of work of somber, painfully personal and sometimes extremely dark affecting music. The lyrics are so amazing, it's bewildering how all the thoughts ended up so dead-on and gorgeous. Stuart paints some dark and lovely landscapes for the beautiful band backing him. This second CD also sees the band slowing the tempo and deeping the thought. Songs like "Cherry Blossoms" and "She's Gone", are stripped bare right before your ears. Both haunting your head with each word and each note. Chilling piano, artfully mastered strings and a full range of horns add to the delicious mix already present. There's even psuedo-childhood tales of terrible relatives gone bad and eventually sad. ("My Sister") This of course is delivered with a very playful bit of music, twisting the sad story into a dark humorous one that a long lost relative might leave in their journal. The disc becomes even grand in nature at times. The overwhelming "Tiny Tears" and heartfelt "Talk To Me", thrive with a lush production and stylish delivery reserved for much more high-profiled records. A very nice side effect to being a great band with this particular disc. This is a perfect mood record. (NO, not like Enya) I find myself getting lost within its trees at times half-way uncomfortable, but always wanting to explore more. It's a record that begs for candle lit walls and tall glasses of red wine. For severe quiet and almost gut-wrenching attention. It's ... , it's beautiful, it's deviant and it's dirty. It wants the listener to lay down on the floor, stare into space and take it all in. It's all of this and so much more. Now Stuart's Nick Cave-like voice might not be everyone's cup of tea, but the sheer quality of it along with the music, makes one forget any short-comings that this record simply DOES NOT HAVE. It is my favorite record because it offers something bands like Radiohead only fail to deliver, a truely unique experience. This is not a jab at Radiohead mind you, but I just want to point out that a record like Kid A can never hold a candle to this disc. Yes it's that good. I will only say get it if you are truely OPEN-MINDED and have a jones for something amazing that has really gone over-looked. The last ten years have given us music lovers a great collection of wonderful and diverse records...file this one under both.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Dark, Urban Masterpiece, June 8, 2004
Has it really been ten years? Almost. What is sure is the fact this record is one of the most underrated, underapreciated and flat-out overlooked record our time. Music this beautiful, haunting, at times overbearingly depressing will always dwell far beneath the public eye, and while elitist, is part of what gives Tindersticks their charm. Very much like the mysterious gentleman or lady in the rear of the bar, down, yet dapper and collected, on the verge of tears, this music at first can seem quite unaproachable. For those of us who allowed ourselves to be immersed in the layers of somberness and calculated, delicate orhestrations, this has proven to be one of the most constantly rewarding records of our generation. Somewhere between Leonard Cohen's dense tales of loss, hope and regret, Isaac Hayes 70's soul string and horn arrangements and Miles Davis' penchant for coolness and restraint, this is soul music not borne out of troubled times in the 60's south, this is soul music for the insecure urbanites wallowing in a sea of self-doubt,prescription drugs and dark uptown bars right before closing time. Never again did the Tindersticks ever sound so glum, so brilliant and so on top of a world that was never quite ready for them, or just not willing to accept in them a part of themselves they would rather keep buried deep in the shadows of their subconcious past, a place the Tindersticks and their fans know all too well.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An Unforgettable Recording, June 21, 2004
After hearing Tindersticks' debut album, I thought there was no way that the band could equal or surpass that masterpiece with any subsequent album. When I bought this sometime later, I maintained that opinion until I sat down and really listened to it.
Tindersticks II continues in the same vein mined by the first album: sadness, loneliness, confusion, and alienation abound.
Though I do not care for the whispery style of a couple of the cuts which make them hard to decipher, Tindersticks II is packed with the kind of morose, bittersweet, and melancholy songs that might have some ready to take the gas pipe, but that put me into an attitude of introspection and calm reflection on the vagaries of love and life. The "duende" in the music is palpable and that "duende" is what makes this such a masterful and unforgettable recording. And Stuart Staples' deep, rich and sensitive voice is the perfect vehicle for communicating that "duende".
My favorites include the spare and somber Tiny Tears with its lonely, soulful organ, the driving Snowy In F# Minor (so reminiscent of Arthur Lee), the instrumentals Vertrauen II and III, the spirited Talk to Me, the regretful No More Affairs, the lilting She's Gone, and the mournful Mistakes.
Also important is a fine duet featuring Stuart Staples and Carla Torgerson on Travelling Light, a tale of separation and recrimination.
Tindersticks II is a powerful recording that has earned a spot in my heavy rotation. I highly recommend this CD to any music fans who like a touch of darkness in their music. The only negative is the lack of lyrics with the liner notes. Check it out, Tindersticks won't disappoint you.
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