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Oct 21, 2015Most of 1989 is much denser, without betraying Adams's inherent aesthetic.... Unfortunately, there are nearly as many misfires on 1989 as there are successful experiments.
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Oct 1, 2015The result: an album with zero purpose but worth a listen.
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Sep 30, 2015There's no disguising how Ryan Adams flips Taylor Swift's 1989 upside-down, turning a moment of triumph into bedsit introspection, a concept that is undoubtedly theoretically interesting, but the record works because Adams doesn't play this as a stunt.
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Sep 25, 2015So it isn’t better than Swift’s album, as that would be a pretty hard album to improve on. What Adams has done though is to look at it through another prism, and created a pure break-up album.
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Sep 25, 2015It’s just a shame that as entertaining as such popular revisionism can be, his 1989 will be remembered more as a curiosity than it does a full-bore artistic statement.
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Sep 24, 2015It plays like the latest chapter in his ongoing recent Tom-Petty-meets-the-Smiths re-imagining of the Reagan years.
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UncutOct 27, 2015There are worth while curiosities here: his "Bad Blood" is utterly tuneless, but "Blank Space" is appealingly tremulous. [Dec 2015, p.67]
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Sep 22, 2015Mr. Adams isn’t brave enough to depart meaningfully from the script. Where the songs work, it’s because of Ms. Swift’s bulletproof melodies. When they fail, it’s because of his conservatism.
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Nov 5, 2015There is comparatively little room for Adams and his mournful guitar. He may begin the likes of Bad Blood and Blank Space by unearthing appealing melodies from Swift’s harsh, mega-pop productions, but once the choruses kick in, Adams is at the mercy of their unyielding, playground-style chants.
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Sep 28, 2015All most of the candle-held-to-the-sun versions here reveal--from the hushed, sad, fingerpicky take on Blank Space to the hushed, sad, strummy take on Out of the Woods--is a strong urge to listen to Swift herself.
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Sep 25, 2015Adams' 1989, for all its sincerity and technical execution, is ultimately hollow because it's nothing but context.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 74 out of 122
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Mixed: 18 out of 122
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Negative: 30 out of 122
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Sep 22, 2015
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Sep 26, 2015
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Sep 22, 2015