Love Goes

Love Goes is the third studio album by English singer Sam Smith. It was released on 30 October 2020 through Capitol Records. The album was originally planned to be titled "To Die For" and was due for release in June 2020 but was delayed amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Smith also felt it was insensitive to use the word "die" due to what many people were going through. The album won a GLAAD Media Award in the Outstanding Music Artist category in April 2021.
Background.
In an interview with Zach Sang in October 2019, Smith confirmed that their third album would be released in 2020, and said it would feature "fewer ballads and plenty of poppier tracks" than their previous albums, which they called an "acoustic-y, soulful version of pop music". Smith went on to explain that the reception to their recent songs had "almost given me permission to kinda do what I've always dreamed of doing but I was always scared to do, which is pop music." Smith described the album as their "first proper heartbreak album". In an interview with Apple Music's Zane Lowe, Smith said
Smith opened a pop-up store in Soho, London named after the album in February 2020 before the release of the single "To Die For".
Release and title.
Originally planned to be titled "To Die For", Smith's third album was due to be released on 1 May 2020, but was then pushed back to 5 June 2020. By the end of March, Smith had confirmed that they had decided to delay the album till later in the year amid the COVID-19 pandemic. On their social media account, they posted the following message: "I have done a lot of thinking the last few weeks and feel that the title of my album and imminent release doesn't feel right ... I have to come to the decision to continue working on the album and make some important changes and additions. I will be renaming the album and pushing back the release date—both of which are to be confirmed at this time".
On Friday 17 April, Smith explained the reasons for changing the album during an interview with Zoe Ball on BBC Radio 2, stating that the "album had the word 'die' in the title, which I just felt really uncomfortable with, with what's happening [coronavirus] and it's so important for me to be sensitive to my fans and to people listening to my music. This has been a really sad and awful time for us, so I've changed the album title, I'm going to change the album cover." The original cover art depicted Smith facing head-on with hands all around them. The hands on the album cover belong to Smith's "chosen family", Shea Diamond, Alok Menon, Jeff Hova, and Madison Phillips. Upon postponing the album, Smith announced that a new cover art would be produced.
Singles.
Before its delay, Smith had released a number of singles in promotion of the album. "Promises" with Calvin Harris, "Fire on Fire" from the miniseries "Watership Down", "Dancing with a Stranger" with Normani, "How Do You Sleep?", "I Feel Love" (Smith's cover of Donna Summer's 1977 single), "To Die For", and "I'm Ready" with Demi Lovato were all included on the album's original preorder, but are now all included as bonus tracks on the album, with the exception of "I Feel Love".
"My Oasis" featuring Burna Boy was released as the lead single from the album on 30 July 2020, followed by the second single "Diamonds" on 18 September 2020. With the release of the album, the music video for "Kids Again" was released. It serves as the third single.
Critical reception.
On Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, "Love Goes" received an average score of 64 based on 13 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Alexis Petridis's review for "The Guardian" described "Love Goes" as a "heartbreak album [that] plays it safe in hard times", noting that "Smith attempts to mix despair with euphoria on an album that delivers plenty of gloom but not much glitter". In terms of production, Petridis said the album did differ from Smith's previous work in that it swapped "retro-soul afflictions" for "misty pop-facing electronics, gentle tropical house shadings and Auto-Tuned backing vocals". Robin Murray of "Clash" awarded the album six out of ten, calling it "a tale of heartbreak that could benefit from focus", noting that the track listing contained 17 songs and although there were some "exemplary pop moments", "it struggles to maintain momentum". Similarly, "The Independent"s Fiona Sturges referred to "Love Goes" as one of the "reasonable break-up albums you're likely to hear" and that you would "long for it to land a few punches". Elsewhere in the review, Sturges said "For the most part, the mood here is pensive, the ballads plentiful and the pace glacial, with little evidence of the wild abandon that the singer supposedly longs for. It's to Smith's credit, but also their undoing, that they are just too damned nice." In her review for "NME", Ilana Kaplan said that although Smith said the album would have "fewer ballads and plenty of poppier tracks", "at its core its Smith's knack for sap and soul – and their singular, chilling vocals – that forms the base of the record. When it comes to songwriting, Smith oscillates towards what they know."
In writing a review for "The New York Times", Jon Pareles was more complimentary, focussing on Smith's voice, calling it "a prodigious instrument: a pearly, androgynous croon, at once powerful and defenseless." Noting Smith's work with familiar collaborators (Jimmy Napes, Guy Lawrence and Stargate, amongst others), Pareles said "they built neatly structured, immediately legible pop tracks that open up arena-sized reverberations and sometimes beckon toward the dance floor. Many of Smith's new songs also stir in a strong new emotion: the resentment of a lover betrayed. The bile and the beat cut through the self-pity, though it wouldn’t be a Sam Smith album without a good wallow or five.". "Entertainment Weekly"s Leah Greenblatt was also complimentary of the album, saying "the record remains rooted in a sort of open-vein vulnerability; the bruised, tender manifesto of a Kid Who Cares Too Much." She praised the album's ballads: "it's the prettily composed ballads — wounded, swooning, steeped in regret — that tend to lead", particularly picking out "For the Lover That I Lost" and "Breaking Hearts".
Commercial performance.
"Love Goes" debuted at number five on the US "Billboard" 200 chart, earning 41,000 album-equivalent units (including 18,000 copies as pure album sales) in its first week. This became Smith's third US top-ten album. The album's songs also accumulated a total of 29.66 million on-demand streams that week.
Track listing.
Tracks 12—16 are all listed as bonus tracks on some streaming platforms.
Notes
Personnel and credits.
Credits adapted from Smith's official website.
Personnel.
Artists
Musicians and producers
Technicians
"Love Goes: Live at Abbey Road Studios".
Love Goes: Live at Abbey Road Studios is the third live album by English singer songwriter Sam Smith, and was released on 19 March 2021 by Capitol Records. The album was recorded at Abbey Road Studios and features song's from Smith's third album "Love Goes" (2020), as well as previous singles "Lay Me Down (Sam Smith song)" from debut album "In the Lonely Hour" (2014) and "Too Good at Goodbyes" from 2017's "The Thrill of It All". For the live album, Smith also covered Cyndi Lauper's 1984 song "Time After Time".
In a weekly round-up of LGBT+/queer releases for "Billboard" that week, Stephen Daw said "regardless of what's being sung, "Love Goes: Live at Abbey Road Studios" shows off Smith's phenomenal vocal talent yet again." Smith's cover of "Time After Time" was called "faithful" by "Rolling Stone"s Jon Blistein.