Oh, Hometown Glory. The only song in this rate to get an even score, and the first song to finish with an average of eight or more. The first song Adele ever released, even before she was signed to XL Recordings. The song was written in ten minutes, after Adele's mother told her to leave home and dorm at her university. In 2007, she put the record out on Jamie T's boutique label, and only five hundred copies were pressed. It failed to chart, but was later released as the third official single from 19. Thanks to music licensing, it charted at #19. It was released in the fall of 2008 as an official single in the US, and, although it never charted on the Hot 100, it netted her a second consecutive Grammy nomination for Pop Female Vocal Performance. (She lost to Beyoncé.)
Ugh, so gorgeous! I prefer this understated side of Adele to the more melodramatic antics of something like "Set Fire to the Rain." (Not that she doesn't do them both fantastically, but I love connecting with her incredible voice on a more intimate level.) It would have been nice to see "Hometown Glory" crack the top twenty, but I know she'll be well-represented on that front with "Someone Like You."
I think eight is a perfect score for Hometown Glory (although I gave it a 6.) It's hard not to get pulled into the sweep of it all, but some of those lyrics ...
It seems that a song really has to dial it up to 11 to make any sort of impact with you.
Well, I liked plenty of Adele of songs in this rate.
Hometown Glory was my lowest.
I gave Chasing Pavements, Rolling In The Deep, Cold Shoulder, Rumour Has It, and Someone Like You all 9s and above.
Oh well.
Well, I liked plenty of Adele of songs in this rate.
Hometown Glory was my lowest.
I gave Chasing Pavements, Rolling In The Deep, Cold Shoulder, Rumour Has It, and Someone Like You all 9s and above.
Oh well.
Well, I liked plenty of Adele of songs in this rate.
Hometown Glory was my lowest.
I gave Chasing Pavements, Rolling In The Deep, Cold Shoulder, Rumour Has It, and Someone Like You all 9s and above.
Oh well.
What does that have to do with anything? My point is that any song without a booming orchestra in the background you call a "snooze."
I think eight is a perfect score for Hometown Glory (although I gave it a 6.) It's hard not to get pulled into the sweep of it all, but some of those lyrics ...
Maybe so. I really do get pulled into the sweep of it every time, though. Probably because I first heard this song around the time I was going off to college, so it hits me in just the right way because of those memories.
What does that have to do with anything? My point is that any song without a booming orchestra in the background you call a "snooze."
Umm, most songs in that list do not have a booming orchestra and I gave them all 9s and above.
Also gave 5 more toned down Amy songs 9s and above.
I don't see your point.
I think eight is a perfect score for Hometown Glory (although I gave it a 6.) It's hard not to get pulled into the sweep of it all, but some of those lyrics ...
Not Fair, the second single off of Lily's highly successful second album It's Not Me, It's You, continued the success of the album by giving her a top five hit in the UK, Australia, and the Netherlands. Lily wrote it herself, and it pays homage to the Rawhide theme to tell a tale of a woman dealing with a guy who's good on paper - but bad in the bedroom?
Could he be worth it everywhere else? Or do his inadequacies as a lover hint at his moral failings altogether? Lily leaves it up for the listener to decide ...
... I'd like to post two reviews from TSJ's initial publishing of this single to express how I might interpret things.
Quote:
Originally posted by Edward Okulicz
Not fair? Not funny either. Suppose a man, say, Mike Skinner, put out a song that went “My bird is rubbish at sucking dick and halfway through us doing it pretends to have a headache, man, that’s a load of pants”, what score would you give it? Okay, swap the genders, keep that score intact. Lily Allen’s misandrous moaning shoots for witty but sinks under obvious rhymes, labored lines and a delivery that alternates between bored, boring and “can you believe I just said that?”. Yes, we can, we were trying to avoid listening to the atrociously dinky country pastiche you were inflicting on the world.
Quote:
Originally posted by Jonathan Bradley
One of Lily Allen’s favorite, and, let’s be blunt, cheapest production tricks is to take supposedly naff genres and recontextualize them as part of the contemporary pop sphere she occupies. Importantly, she never does so by fully engaging with these genres; like her dilettante tourist in “LDN,” her genre-exploration is undertaken with as minimal an engagement on her behalf as possible. So she transformed ska, as on her first couple singles, into a brain-dead exercise in syncopation and sunshine, and she turned polka rhythms into a nauseating just-say-no lecture on “Alfie.” Her new single has her appropriating country, showing even more disdain for the musical traditions of the genre than she has with her previous influences. Over a rinky-dink “Rawhide” rhythm — deployed for no purpose greater than irony for the sake of irony, or, as the rest of the world knows it, abject stupidity —she complains about a sexually unsatisfying boyfriend, ever-mindful of the supposed daring of her subject matter, like a one-woman Family Guy episode. The entire point of the instrumental here is to demonstrate that Allen can adopt a genre as unfashionable as country and remain removed from its supposed cultural uncouthness; she clearly has no interest in developing a compelling tune out of these ideas, so let’s forget her indefensible musical choices and focus on the lyrics. Allen’s lyric is an exercise in merciless solipsism, and one so determined that she even makes her self-obsession an object of her self-obsession. Immediately after complaining that she has to sleep in the post-coital wet-spot after unsatisfying sex, she acknowledges “all the nice things” that her boyfriend has done for her. This is no exercise in humility, however. As with her entire career, Allen’s selfishness is mentioned only as a device to focus further attention on her own person. I don’t know whether Lily the woman is lovely or revolting, but Lily the recorded personality is a deeply unpleasant character. Worst of all, she is so unsympathetic that it is impossible to derive any joy from her own self-regard whatsoever.
Jameson, will you still love me tomorrow? MY least favorite non-**** You Lily song, and I'm thrilled to see the back of it. I still gave it a seven though.