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Mar 1, 2013100The lack of vanity, the frank way it strives for accessibility only serves to further magnify the greatness of Anxiety. It does the most ideal thing art can do: it tries to make sense of life itself, without pretense or guile.
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Mar 1, 201390The veritable smorgasbord that forms this album is made up of a great many influences, but when all of them are put together, the result is a musical statement that’s innovative on every imaginable level.
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Feb 25, 201388Anxiety matches the emotional heights and immediacy of the music Ashin was inspired by, but what arrives from his limitations--as a singer, as a DIY-ist--adds to the record a personal foundation and raw authenticity no amount of budget could erect.
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Mar 5, 201387Throughout Anxiety, tracks fail to resolve--“Counting,” “Promises,” “Gonna Die”--and initially I thought it was a songwriting flaw, coming on so fantastically strong there was nowhere left to go. But .... On multiple listens none of this plays accidental--songs run aground as a means of setting the next episode in motion.
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Feb 26, 201385An album where Ashin fearlessly reveals himself as a person and an artist and dares you to open up in the same way.
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Feb 25, 201383It grows beyond its deeply emotional roots, to become whatever you want it to be.
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Mar 4, 201380With all its messy emotions, unfiltered memories and contradicting revelations, Anxiety shows that it’s not only possible to write a self-conscious record without the protective shield of anonymity, it can be just as thrilling.
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Feb 28, 201380Ashin raises the bar. He relinquishes his inhibitions on Anxiety, an R&B diamond in the dense, desultory rough.
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Feb 25, 201380Anxiety is a draining front-to-back listen; it becomes much more comfortable when one is able to take each track as an individual single. However, there is a reward for making it to the end of Ashin's therapy session.
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Feb 25, 201380Moving toward more mainstream sounds makes this album some of Autre Ne Veut's most distinct and confident music yet.
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Mar 15, 201375Anxiety is the rare electro-pop album that's wholly synthetic, but plays without a hint of icy artificiality. [No. 96, p.53]
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Apr 2, 201370Many of the songs feel like they're improvised by someone with an encyclopedic knowledge of vocal pop music.
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Mar 5, 201370This is an album of climaxes and cathartic streams of consciousness, but an album listenable from start to finish.
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Mar 5, 201370The highlights are somewhat front-loaded; Autre Ne Veut’s schtick begins to wear by the end.
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Mar 4, 201370While Ashin is clearly a major talent, he just needs to dial it down from time to time if he’s to deliver a wholly satisfying record.
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Mar 1, 201370Anxiety's blend of heaviness and gloss is unexpectedly affecting. [Apr 2013, p.67]
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Mar 1, 201370Despite subjecting himself to psychoanalysis and attempting to purge himself of ego, Ashin has created something emphatically empathetic out of his inner turmoil. He's going through it like everyone else, but the very personal Anxiety is remarkably messy, dramatic, poignant, and at times, beautiful.
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Feb 28, 201370It’s an entertaining record to hear, but at times a devastating one to listen to.
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Feb 25, 201370Although this is at times a frustratingly inconsistent demonstration of his talents, Autre Ne Veut is still one of the more accomplished acts to have emerged from the bedroom R’n'B/future pop/whatever niche.
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Feb 25, 201370Anxiety moves between smooth grooves and kaleidoscopic electronics, but it’s the sensual vocals that carry the record.
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Feb 28, 201360The best of these songs, by a long ways, is "Counting." [...] Yet elsewhere, Ashin sounds like he's treading water, emoting floridly but to no real purpose over shiny, surface-y arrangements.
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Feb 25, 201360Despite all its plasticized production and cartoon antics, however, what makes Anxiety so endearing is that it's the candid expression of an artist with nothing left to hide, and something real to share.
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Feb 28, 201350Ashin, in giving so much of himself away, leaves little scope for the kind of mystery that might enable his musical settings to transcend their functional pop status. [Feb 2013, p.60]