Album Rating: 4.0

I have never heard slowdive sound anything like Kisses or Alife, am I missing a piece of their discography? Or just bad memory on my part? Shanty gets a shoegaze pass for having more reverb than the two aforementioned tracks but still has quite a bit more groove than previous tunes I’ve heard of theirs



If you put a blindfold on me and played this on shuffle I’d swear those tracks were performed by Wild Nothing. Which is not a diss on slowdive i promise, as poorly as WN’s discog has aged lol

Album Rating: 3.5

Kisses has some of the same indistinct JFAD/Holding Our Breath songwriting in it, but I mean more broadly that this album recalls the general sound of 90s gaze (as opposed to the ultra-slick nu-gaze they dealt in upon reuniting)

Not sure why groove should discount something as being shoegaze - a lot of og shoegaze had a beat to it (Chapterhouse, Curve, Soda Stereo, Medicine etc) and the palette on Shanty is gaze through and through

Album Rating: 4.0

No yeah groove doesn't discount something as shoegaze, my phrasing on the last page was definitely hyperbolic, exaggerated, more so my in the moment reaction to how *different* many passages on this album feel to me compared to slowdive's previous work, and how, as much as this album harkens to classic shoegaze (i've read some comments here and elsewhere about this being classic slowdive/a return to form/etc), the sense i get is that the band is also gracefully embracing modern indie trends in a way that they have not before



Slowdive drums have always sounded more...easy-going to me, for lack of a better term, than some of the drumwork on here. The faster tunes on this sound more like modern indie to me (late-era beach fossils, wild nothing, etc), heck beach fossils even did a track with rachel goswell on Somersault, and a lot of the songs on that record sound like the handful on here that i'm talking about above



and i know that's tough because slowdive have had a huge impact on modern indie and dream pop, so one could argue that those bands are just taking their cues from slowdive, but idk if that would be the whole picture here



i agree that kisses for instance sounds more like Just For A Day than it does Souvlaki, but the only tracks that come close to that cleaner, groovier sound I'm talking about are still wayyy hazy by comparison (ballad of sister sue for instance, or brighter, or waves) but still those tracks are just not nearly as *dance-y* as some of the tracks on here get!!!



ok i'm gonna stop typing now but is there anything in this jumble of my words that makes sense? this record definitely delivers good ol' shoegaze in multiple ways but there's something new in here that i cant put my finger on

Album Rating: 4.0

Woah just contribute a review octogon!

Album Rating: 4.0

Jesper’s is already so good!

Album Rating: 3.0

this definitely sounds way more like indie/dream pop than shoegaze for me, specially when compared to their previous albums

Album Rating: 4.0

Yeah I definitely lean on the side of this leaning much more on the dream/indie pop end of the equation than Slowdive usually does. Certainly there are shoegaze textures throughout but the very clean recording sound and generally fairly distinct vocals kinda prevent it from having that more noisy/hazy wall of sound feel that true shoegaze has. The self-titled had a similar modern recording sound but compositionally and texturally still read much more as gaze than this one does imo. It's all pulling at straws though.

Album Rating: 3.0

my main gripe with this album is how unfortunately unmemorable it is for me, it is a _fine_ experience listening to it, but as soon as it ends, I completely forget about everything I just heard and I lack any desire to ever come back to it

Album Rating: 4.0

I know how you feel, have the same issue with most of metal. There’s quite some I enjoy, but have no idea afterwards about what I heard.

Album Rating: 5.0

Extremely memorable album for me tbh

Album Rating: 3.5

If the journey is enjoyable I couldn’t care less if I don’t remember it once the album has finished, in fact if anything that’s a benefit in some circumstances

Hmm, also tentatively agree with Boney in the % of gaze but it does still gaze debate. I’m not applying actual %s but less than Souvlaki is (not comparing to S/T LP which was very clearly the genre of bad music / or Pyg which was a different beast entirely)

Album Rating: 4.0

“If the journey is enjoyable I couldn’t care less if I don’t remember it once the album has finished, in fact if anything that’s a benefit in some circumstances.”



I’d say whether you remember the music is a strong indicator of subjective appraisal. If a whole album passes by without me noticing anything, then it’s average at best, isn’t it? Wouldn’t like to revisit those.

Album Rating: 3.5

You can remember vague things about it without exact specifics, but not sure if that’s what was meant. Anyway, it was a reply to proto who said this was fine while it was on, just not memorable enough

Fair enough if you absolutely NEED that lasting memory, I just don’t always consider it a necessity. If I remember liking something mid-listen then I’ll return regardless of whether I can recall specifics once it’s over

Album Rating: 4.0

You’re right, vague impressions can be sufficient to trigger repeated listens, such as those about body reactions. Otherwise it’s (mostly) just dull background music.

Album Rating: 4.0

I'd say as a general matter I need to be able to remember either A) the music itself or B) the feelings I experience while listening to something for me to consider it good (note that neither of these things inherently makes music good, just that all music I consider good has at least one of these qualities). Basically though, if I find bits of the music popping into my head unbidden and not in an annoying way, then that's a good indication that I like it. Or, if I come away with a strong sense of the feelings the music made me experience, and they were good feelings that I want to experience again, even if I can't remember explicit musical phrases or passages, that's also a strong indication. Most of the best music is going to have both of these to a strong degree.

Album Rating: 3.5

Yeah, I was initially taking memorability to mean specificity, like specific segments, hooks, melodies etc. whereas after thinking about it, memorability doesn’t have to mean that. It can be a vague essence of whatever it was you just heard, a feeling or a vibe.

There are tons of albums I wouldn’t deem conventionally memorable in any sort of specific sense, that I do enjoy greatly (but I guess this could descend into semantics?)

Memorability isn’t inherently a positive either, which you touched upon

Album Rating: 3.5

Music discussions on a... music website??????? 😲

Album Rating: 4.0

Yeah!? Where are the coffee & breakfast updates?

Album Rating: 4.0

Very pleasing album

Album Rating: 5.0

Still is my favorite album from 2023