| |
Celeb News: Warrior Reviews | 74/100 | 16 critics
Member Since: 12/3/2011
Posts: 11,947
|
Warrior Reviews | 74/100 | 16 critics
Los Angeles Times, 3.5/4 (88%)
Quote:
|
Enter Kesha, who on her second album, "Warrior," has perfected the art of aspirational rebellion and released a joyous celebration of defiance. By stomping just at the edge of parental propriety and sneaking in (mostly) well-crafted lyrics, her new record confirms her place as the loosest of the dance divas, one who not only preaches on the art of the party like few since Andrew W.K., but who also delivers the message through inventive, beat-heavy musical cannonballs, most produced by hitmaker Dr. Luke, that pummel with pleasure.
|
Quote:
|
Out in Kesha land, songs sound dumb — and, yes, sometimes they are — but contain insidious, insightful messages of youth and desire. She's Pink mixed with Katy Perry and Lady Gaga with a dollop of Rihanna, but waves a freakier flag than any of them. Where Gaga is the inheritor to Elton John's brand of rebellion, Kesha's dueting with Iggy Pop and talking about "Dirty Love." She's rock where Perry is pomp.
|
Quote:
|
Will the parents get it? Probably not; nor will advocates of nuance. It is necessary to put yourself in the heads of her target audience to appreciate its power. Most adults still won't connect, and they'll roll their eyes with the first thumping beats. But then, those in charge have a history of criticizing what they don't understand.
|
Billboard, Positive (81%)
Quote:
|
"Warrior" is a pure pop album with rock influences, despite Ke$ha's attempts to make it the inverse.
|
Quote:
|
One thing that's more apparent this time around is Ke$ha's desire to prove her vocal prowess.
|
Quote:
|
Provides evidence that there's more to Ke$ha than the glitter-loving, Auto-Tuned hot mess image she so desperately tries to run away from.
|
Quote:
|
Provides evidence that there's more to Ke$ha than the glitter-loving, Auto-Tuned hot mess image she so desperately tries to run away from.
|
AllMusic, 4/5 (80%)
Quote:
|
There were two paths Ke$ha could've followed on her second album, Warrior. She could've tried a respectable street, sticking a pen in her heart so her feelings would pour onto the page, or she could have not changed a note, replicating the glitter-bomb of Animal. Cannily, she decided to split the difference between these two routes, remaining defiant in her tastelessness but flashing just enough depth to show she's not a passing fad.
|
Quote:
|
Her gleeful embrace of low-rent taste separates her from her peers, every one of them containing some sort of aspiration of high-thread-count sophistication, something the ever-calculating pop star could possibly care less about.
|
Quote:
|
Ke$ha may play dumb but she isn't stupid: she knows a good hook, whether it's in the rhythm, chorus, lyric, or melody, she knows how far to take it to the edge, knows how to be tacky without being gross.
|
Quote:
|
It's a wall-to-wall party for the freaks, burnouts, outcasts, and misfits and if you don't get it that's your fault, not hers.
|
Drowned in Sound, 8/10 (80%)
Quote:
|
Becoming such a polarising figure was undoubtedly a huge achievement for Ke$ha, an artist utterly determined to get up the noses of absolutely everyone who might have beef with a young woman talking about drinking, partying and sexing it up. In public. The horror.
|
Quote:
|
it's stunning. Unexpectedly, Warrior's slower, party-comedown, vocally-driven moments – yes, there are large swathes of this album not featuring That Sort Of Gnarly Rap Thing - are frequently its highlights. There’s a deep structural knowledge of pop on display, without which this album, rammed with sonic mash, would disappear into a black hole of insanity.
|
Quote:
|
There's much to be said for Ke$ha's willingness to experiment with everything, up to and including hitherto unexplored corners of the kitchen sink.
|
Quote:
|
There will be many who absolutely hate Warrior, with its insistence on turning the volume up to 12 and wallowing in baser joys. There will be people who won’t even listen to it because it’s Ke$ha, and frankly that’s their loss. Others will love it for its balls-out attitude, seen not nearly enough from any artist nowadays let alone a female pop starlet, and willingness to fall on its face in search of something new. It's undeniably ******* insane, but Warrior is never dull, always fun, and frequently a thrillingly unpredictable ride.
|
AV Club, B (75%)
Quote:
|
Perhaps being consistently underestimated explains why Warrior, Ke$ha’s second album, occasionally feels vengeful.
|
Quote:
|
Of course, writing quality tunes is the best revenge on any haters. And although Warrior has no shortage of modern techno-pop songs espousing endless love and/or long, magical nights (“Wherever You Are,” “Die Young,” “C’Mon”), the album takes some bold musical risks.
|
Quote:
|
Those who already loathe Ke$ha probably won’t find Warrior any more endearing than her past work. (Not that she’d care—if anything, the singer seems galvanized by polarized reactions.) But anyone up for giving her a second chance—or recognizing she has actual singing, writing, and performing talent—just might be pleasantly surprised.
|
Entertainment Weekly, B (75%)
Quote:
|
Love her or hate her, Ke$ha always inspires some good debates. Her defenders say she's a pop rebel who tweaks sexual double standards. (Well, she does call a guy a ''****'' on her new album, Warrior. Feminism!) Her detractors say she's a shameless promoter of boozy toothbrushing, no better than a frat boy. But neither side gives her credit for the fact that she's actually really funny. Just listen to the sultry slow-burner about hooking up with a ghost (''Supernatural'') or the duet with Iggy Pop that claims Rick Santorum keeps his V-neck sweater on during sex (''Dirty Love''). Now ask yourself, could Rihanna pull that off?
|
Quote:
|
Ke$ha's filthy jokes may be what separates her from her peers.
|
Quote:
|
Co-written and co-produced by longtime collaborator Dr. Luke, who also helmed Katy Perry's smash Teenage Dream, and you can hear strong echoes of that record here.
|
Quote:
|
Of course, that only makes the party-rap breakdowns better, because there's still one thing that's 100 percent Ke$ha. When you need someone to rhyme ''saber-toothed tiger'' with ''warm Budweiser,'' you know who to call.
|
Boston Globe, Positive (70%)
Quote:
|
On Ke$ha’s second full-length, the pop star-lightning rod has again enlisted the aid of multiple producers and songwriters per track in a Hollywood script-doctor approach to music that’s either the death knell of “authenticity” or business as usual, depending on your cultural exasperation level.
|
Quote:
|
Even the less crossover single-focused tracks, like “Crazy Kids” — part dirty South hip-hop influence, part straight-mall pop — insist on darting between genres with speed-bump transitions. The standout Strokes collaboration “Only Wanna Dance With You” is an utterly glorious exception.
|
Quote:
|
Too many cooks in the kitchen notwithstanding, it amounts to 12 songs here with some 40 perfectly crafted hooks.
|
Rolling Stone, 3.5/5 (70%)
Quote:
|
A 'rock' manife$to where the cheapest, cheesiest moments are the best
|
Quote:
|
Ke$ha was born to be a rock star. She's a disco queen who dresses like Axl Rose and overdoses on personality like the New York Dolls. She rules pop radio with her megasleaze boombox beats, junk-shop rags and bleached-Sabbath hair. We all who glitter girls who dress like Ke$ha, talk like Ke$ha, party like Ke$ha and slap the world around like Ke$ha. But it's insanely rare to see one of these parking-lot queens roll with the big-league pop stars. When she's on, Ke$ha can make everyone else on the charts seem like a church lady.
|
Quote:
|
Warrior doesn't hit the giddy peaks of 2010's Animal, but it has a crackpot sense of rock history.
|
Quote:
|
Really the one way Ke$ha could fair to rock is to get sensitive, turn spiritual and start doing acoustic ballads about past lives. This only happens for about a third of Warrior, so it's safe to say the great Ke$ha sincerity crisis of 2012 has been narrowly averted for now.
|
Quote:
|
Ke$ha is hardly the first rock star to discover her crudest, cheapest, cheesiest ideas are her best. In fact, that's how you can tell she's a true rock & roll child.
|
PopMatters, 7/10 (70%)
Quote:
|
As easy as it is for people to mock her hedonistic sorority-girl party jams (and it is incredibly easy—and fun, to boot!), Ke$ha has done something that few other dance divas have done in the course of their entire careers: she’s crafted a wholly unique identity and personality for herself, and in the increasingly crowded realm of soundalike pop radio, it’s that very thing that has helped make her stand out.
|
Quote:
|
Toss in her co-writing of the best Britney song in years, her positively bonkers collaboration with the Flaming Lips, and the fact that she actually covered Dolly Parton’s “Old Flames Can’t Hold a Candle to You” on her Deconstructed EP and pulled off an amazingly faithful take on it, and you realize that there is much more to Ke$ha than meets the eye (you have to get past a lot of glitter first).
|
Quote:
|
In truth, there’s a lot of fascinating sonic detours that Ke$ha takes with Warrior, all while retaining the bratty edge that has made her the star that she is today. Not everything works, but for a major label pop album, the ratio of material that succeeds is notably high, as on her sophomore release, she’s already willing to take some risks with her sound.
|
Quote:
|
As Warrior proves, Ke$ha is fully aware of the image she’s established and how to cleverly deviate it from it at just the right moment. She’s easy to mock because of her apparent lack of depth, but the frightening truth of the matter is that Ke$ha is an incredibly smart woman, and with Warrior surprising us at almost every turn, she knows exactly what she’s been doing all along.
|
New York Times, Positive (70%)
Quote:
|
There’s no revelation here, only strong fun.
|
Quote:
|
(An EP released concurrently, “Deconstructed,” includes reduced and unprocessed performances of songs, including Dolly Parton’s “Old Flames Can’t Hold a Candle to You,” which Kesha’s mother, Pebe Sebert, helped write. That’s a good move on several counts: a confirmation of country abilities from a rootless cosmopolitan who actually grew up in Nashville, and solid proof, to whomever, that she can sing.)
|
Quote:
|
The album’s persistently cheery idea is living as if you were going to die soon, which is different from living as if you wanted to die soon. She stresses the idea so often, it becomes almost high-minded; this is how she gets some distance from her earlier, jaded, sleazed-out, Autotune-juiced persona, the Kesha of “Tik Tok” and “Blah Blah Blah.”
|
Quote:
|
It means partying as ferocious sentiment and individual existential heroism, an idea less of this time than of the late ’50s, when freedom from societal repression and the threat of annihilation were live topics in this country. “Warrior” is her beatnik record; her “crazy people” seem a bit like Jack Kerouac’s hyper-idealized “mad ones,” those who “burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles.” It’s also a clever bridge toward getting older and writing sweet country songs about how wild we all were. It’s going to be an option for her in five years or so, when she turns 30.
|
SPIN, 7/10 (70%)
Quote:
|
Then again, being a brat who searches and destroys admittedly isn't the wisest long-term creative strategy. Ke$ha's role models the Beastie Boys had given up brass-monkeyed mutiny of the bounty (and AC/DC riffs) by the time their very arty second album rolled around, but they never again came up with personas as entertaining as the ones they started with.
|
Quote:
|
Too much too little too late: Warrior is likable enough, but not only can't it match its predecessor, it's not nearly as exhilarating or disruptive as what fellow slizzered California trashdancer Dev or assorted K-poppers have done in the past two years with basically the same raw materials. So, kinda disappointing, sure — but hardly the end of the world.
|
BBC, Positive (70%)
Quote:
|
However, her debut album Animal turned out to be against-the-odds enjoyable. It matched hooks with humour, and made the most of pop's new obsession with heavily Auto-Tuned vocals. Ke$ha may have been silly, but she wasn't stupid.
|
Quote:
|
But taken as a whole, this is another surprisingly enjoyable album from a pop singer who has managed to broaden her approach without losing her USP.
|
Quote:
|
In fact, Ke$ha's trademark trashiness is still disturbingly infectious.
|
Slant Magazine, 3/5 (60%)
Quote:
|
Most of Warrior sticks to Ke$ha's tried-and-true formula: more misfit anthems, like the title track, a co-write with her mother that, following in the dance steps of her hit "We R Who We R," skews more toward one-size-fits-all self-empowerment than the self-satisfied, Gen Y-specific ambivalence of her debut.
|
Quote:
|
The second half of the album boasts collaborations with Iggy Pop (the "Ballroom Blitz"-style "Dirty Love"), the Black Keys' Patrick Carney (the rootsy "Wonderland"), and the Strokes' Julian Casablancas and Fab Moretti (the faithfully Strokes-esque "Only Wanna Be with You"). En masse, it's an impressive lineup, one that speaks to Ke$ha's previously closeted good taste. And if individual songs aren't exactly revelatory, they at least prove there's an actual beating heart beneath all that baby oil and glitter, specifically the bonus track "Past Lives."
|
Quote:
|
For all the ostensible "growth" and experimentation on display, though, Ke$ha doesn't have much to show for it.
|
NOW, 3/5 (60%)
Quote:
|
It’s always tricky when top-40 pop stars incorporate “what they really listen to” into their music. For glitter queen Ke$ha, this means not only adopting a hard-drinkin’, hard-screwin’ classic rock attitude, as she did on her debut, but also lifting her no-guitars ban, with help from the Black Keys’ Patrick Carney, the Flaming Lips’ Wayne Coyne and the Strokes’ Julian Casablancas and Fabrizio Moretti.
|
Quote:
|
Wisely, Ke$ha’s producers ditch the grab-bag approach in favour of coherency.
|
Quote:
|
So although the new direction isn’t revolutionary, it’s natural enough and distracts from some of the filler.
|
The Guardian, 2/5 (40%)
Quote:
|
Warrior is basically the same product as Animal but with added effing and blinding.
|
Quote:
|
With or without swearing, her blunt-force pop, mainly produced by the emperor of strident electronica, Dr Luke, offers more pain than pleasure.
|
Quote:
|
Auto-Tune, deployed all over the record, turns Kesha's voice into a robo-squawk, and not in a good way.
|
Quote:
|
The master of degeneracy, Iggy Pop, shows her how it's done on the garage-rock duet Dirty Love; his hilariously roguish performance coaxes her into life, and the album's high point comes when she screeches, "I just want your filthy ****ing love!"
|
The Observer, 2/5 (40%)
Quote:
|
Since her last album proper, 2010's Animal, lurid chart-pop siren Kesha has been behaving oddly – befriending Iggy Pop and Alice Cooper; giving blood to the Flaming Lips.
|
Quote:
|
Really, though, her graceless output remains unaffected.
|
Quote:
|
Notionally rebellious tunes such as Crazy Kids, meanwhile, continue to perpetuate the flawed notion that party people are a beleaguered minority in need of Kesha's leadership.
|
I'll update this thread with all Warrior reviews as they come in.
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 1/7/2012
Posts: 5,043
|
Let's do this 
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 10/16/2005
Posts: 16,872
|
Looking good! 
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 10/13/2009
Posts: 3,382
|
This needs to get at least 75
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 2/17/2012
Posts: 8,023
|
She's going to end up with mid 60's.
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 7/15/2012
Posts: 30,915
|
this needs to get at least 90
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 5/10/2012
Posts: 2,078
|
Deserves to at least be in 80's  hopefully 90s
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 5/12/2012
Posts: 18,059
|
I hope she can top Cannibal
|
|
|
|
ATRL Contributor
Member Since: 11/5/2011
Posts: 100,491
|
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 5/25/2010
Posts: 23,013
|
Ke$ha Christ delivers the best pop album of the year, and critics agree.
...Vin
|
|
|
|
ATRL Senior Member
Member Since: 3/22/2012
Posts: 53,769
|
She'll realistically end up in the mid to high 60's, but I'd like to see her end up at 70.
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 3/27/2012
Posts: 27,951
|
I still can't tell if that damn review is positive or negative 
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 12/3/2011
Posts: 11,947
|
Quote:
Originally posted by Monceau
She's going to end up with mid 60's.
|
I agree.
Though you never know. The average RS review score is 61, and she got a 70. And her last release ended up with a 73% with 11 reviews.
I'm expecting mid 60s, but I'd love to see her crack the 70s again.
|
|
|
|
ATRL Contributor
Member Since: 10/3/2010
Posts: 12,334
|
She'll end up with 75+, mark my words 
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 6/16/2006
Posts: 6,439
|
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 4/5/2012
Posts: 7,953
|
I hope it gets 70 at least
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 12/3/2011
Posts: 11,947
|
Quote:
Originally posted by like2throw
is the hq leaked yet?
|
No, just a MQ version of the standard edition with lots of skipping.
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 3/21/2011
Posts: 21,638
|
i hope it gets 75.. 
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 5/28/2012
Posts: 11,243
|
Warrior + thinking about you >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
|
|
|
|
Member Since: 4/3/2012
Posts: 16,501
|
I think she deserves around 70-80. It's a good album. 
|
|
|
|
|
|
