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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed albums.
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Stay Positive
by The Hold Steady
This is the fourth album for the Brooklyn, New York, indie rock quintet.
| LABEL: |
Vagrant |
| RELEASE DATE: |
15 July 2008 |
| DISCS: |
1 disc |
| GENRE(S): |
Rock, Indie |
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
100
Uncut
Staggeringly good.
100
Slant Magazine
It is not only the Hold Steady's best record, but acts as a culmination of all of the ideas, stories, musical paths and character journeys that they've so pointedly led us down before.
100
Entertainment Weekly
Damn if an already nearly perfect album doesn't, with these bonus tracks, gets a little better itself. [18 Jul 2008, p.64]
100
Delusions of Adequacy
Stay Positive is a true testament that good music will always prevail. One can only hope that a band like this will continue to make music for years and years to come because we desperately need it.
90
Dot Music
They've resurrected with this, their fourth album, the seemingly outmoded concept that with enough nurturing and faith, a band - and by extension it's audience - can grow into a beautiful thing.
90
Drowned In Sound
They turn critics into gibbering wrecks unable to write proper reviews and leave us forced to just string together our favourite lyrics like a damn teenage girl scribbles Tokio Hotel choruses onto her bed headboard. But, y’know. Hairier.
90
New Musical Express
Stay Positive not only confirms The Hold Steady’s status as one of the best rock’n’roll bands in the world, but establishes them as one of its most important too.
88
Los Angeles Times
The sound is more varied and lighter on its feet with touches of harpsichord and banjo but anchored by the Hold Steady's signature: thick, humid arena rock, a high-pressure system of cresting guitars and pianos that injects these dramas with tension and embraces all their contradictions and ambiguities.
86
Filter
Self-referential, poetic, spoken-sung performances in dirty beer halls, Midwest anthems that make everyone raise those beers in the beer halls. [Summer 2008, p.92]
84
Pitchfork
While they continue to prove themselves a more convincing classic rock act than should be possible in 2008, there's a tension in this album's lyrics between old-fashioned storytelling and breaking down the fourth wall. Stay Positive is their mostly successful bid to have it both ways.
83
The Onion (A.V. Club)
A record made for blasting and getting blasted, Stay Positive makes it easy to follow through on its title.
80
Rolling Stone
The music is more rousing than ever; the power chords and hair-metal wanks spiked with singalong chants and new instrumental flavors.
80
Prefix Magazine
Considering most of the album is spent describing what life’s like for the rest of us, it’s surprising Stay Positive ends on a relatively self-focused note, courtesy of album highlight “Slapped Actress.”
80
Hartford Courant
Stay Positive is an optimistic record that continues Finn's search for a sense of place.
80
Paste Magazine
Suffice to say, then, if you’ve enjoyed the increasingly accessible path The Hold Steady’s taken over the last four years--and, frankly, if you like raising beers, pumping fists and yelling out choice phrases, how could you not?--then you’ll find Stay Positive nearly flawless.
80
musicOMH.com
If you know what's good for you, however, you'll drink the whole album in, because intelligently constructed and musically thrilling records like this are a rare, rare find.
80
Observer Music Monthly
Reliability is the Hold Steady's calling card, and on Stay Positive they don't stray far from the tried-and-tested combination of orthodox guitar rock and gritty, observational lyrics.
80
Billboard
Brooklyn's working class heroes have stepped up their musicality (harpsichord is featured on "One for the Cutters") and melodic balladry ("Lord, I'm Discouraged" is an aching prayer), while still providing their signature cacophonous anthems.
80
Boston Globe
Ultimately, Stay Positive achieves the admirable feat of being a record you can listen closely to or rock out to, equally adaptable to late-night wallowing and the party at the water tower.
80
The New York Times
Despite some subtle new touches --a harpsichord, a banjo, light strings--the sound proposes constancy.
80
Tiny Mix Tapes
Stay Positive offers up plenty of reasons to let go and believe.
80
The Guardian
At times, the bloodlust in Craig Finn's growl gets too thirsty. But it's the album's closing lyric - "Man, we make our own movies" - that reveals the secret of this band's special powers.
80
PopMatters
While Stay Positive might find Finn in existential contemplation of his past, present and future, thankfully it doesn’t keep him away from his observational wisdom in recounting tales of hedonism, naivety, drugs and alcohol in small town America.
80
Hot Press
As you might expect from a bunch of Springsteen-loving misfits, Stay Positive is delivered with a generous amount of their now trademark skewed cynicism.
80
Mojo
Stay Positive has consistently stronger material than its preecessors and, perhaps more importantly, is sequenced to maximum efficacy. [Aug 2008, p.100]
80
Q Magazine
Stay Positive isn't so much of an instant gratification, but a record that reveals more with each listen. [Aug 2008, p.131]
80
No Ripcord
This is the band’s most mature and consistent record yet.
80
Under The Radar
A rousing and contemplative work that's informed by contradictory sensations. [Fall 2008, p.81]
70
Village Voice
Though the result doesn't quite reach the rarefied heights of 2005's Separation Sunday or the following year's nearly equally great follow-up, Boys and Girls in America, it fits nicely alongside LCD Soundsystem's "Sound of Silver" and the National's "Boxer" as a poignant example of veteran artists maturing gracefully, capturing that feeling you get just after the peak, when you've started noticing the decline but haven't figured out what to do about it yet.
70
Blender
Finn has been sharper and funnier before, and their fast-and-down-the-middle rock has gotten more experimental, which isn't the same as better. But it's still a pretty good way to spend 45 minutes. [Aug 2008, p.86]
69
cokemachineglow
The problem with Stay Positive is that all the great songs subtly exhibit a kind of fin-de-siècle exhaustion, while the obvious attempts to break out of the old ways fall flat.
60
Spin
The Hold Steady are mellowing, and it doesn't really suit them.
60
All Music Guide
Stay Positive is the most sophisticated and erudite THS have ever sounded, and that's a mixed blessing.
The average user rating for this album is 7.9 (out of 10) based on 69 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
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