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Title: Powerful, emotional, not what you might expect from Beck
Review: The transformation of Beck from street musician to eclectic recording artist and songwriting wizard must have been a difficult one, and we see an awful lot of pain in the album. The songs all have a serious, sad, sometimes powerful tone to them, which is not actually matched by the lyrics when you take a good listen - there is hope there.But what really impressed me was the arrangements. There are a lot of strings on here, and the arrangements vary from sparse to bombastic. The fourth song, "Lonesome Tears", in particular has one of the most powerful string arrangements ever commited to disc.Those arrangements - it's obvious that great care was taken in making this album, something which cannot be said for all releases. I played it awfully loud yesterday, and became thoroughly involved. It is a participatory album, not one that listens well in the background. You pretty much have to pay attention to this one.
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