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Zero 7
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed albums.
The Secret Migration
Generally favorable reviews
Based on 29 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 27 votes
Read user comments
Rate this album >
Album Info
Label: V2
Release Date: 17 May 2005
Discs: 1 disc
Genre(s): Indie, Rock
Summary
The psychedelic indie rockers, led by returning core trio of vocalist Jonathan Donahue, guitarist Grasshopper and drummer Jeff Mercel, return with a less-orchestral follow up to 2001's 'All Is Dream.' Longtime collaborator David Fridmann co-produced.
Also By This Artist: All Is Dream Snowflake Midnight
Also On The Web: Official Artist Site
What The Critics Said
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...
Stylus Magazine
Without relying on a crutch of irony and cynicism, they boldly risk sounding cloying in order to summon the emotional honesty necessary to create music that is unabashedly romantic and achingly beautiful.
Read Full Review >Uncut
Mercury Rev's power is undiminished. While never resorting to crude hooks, they build melodies to peaks of graceful intensity. [Album of the Month, Jan 2005, p.114]
Playlouder
Like 'Deserter Songs' and 'All Is Dream' before, 'The Secret Migration' is a compelling, visual album. And yet within this, Mercury Rev have moved on.
Read Full Review >Mojo
Frankly, you could get drunk just on the minutiae here. [Feb 2005, p.92]
Trouser Press
While at times the album becomes so lightheaded it threatens to evaporate into nothingness, it is yet another dazzling achievement for the band.
Read Full Review >Filter
This record doesn't top 2001's All Is Dream, but the bliss of "In The Wilderness" and "The Climbing Rose" were definitely worth the wait. [#14, p.98]
Spin
Rev's overbaked symphonics and space-case triumphalism have become completely indistinguishable from the Flaming Lips. [Jun 2005, p.108]
PopMatters
The difference here is that Mercury Rev have paired down the fringes, allowing the bizarre to slip through the sieve. Only the songs remain. And what gorgeous songs about love and optimism they are.
Read Full Review >Tiny Mix Tapes
Those who like Mercury Rev like them a lot; so while The Secret Migration doesn't happen to migrate into new territory, they are the type of band that could go on making the same album forever and we wouldn't care.
Read Full Review >Paste Magazine
Lushly orchestrated, tenderly lyrical and often rapturous. [Apr/May 2005, p.135]
Delusions of Adequacy
If there’s any fault with this album, it’s the predictability in the songs: there are no hidden surprises, lacking any real breathtaking shifts or unexpected twists waiting to throw the unwary listener off-guard.
Read Full Review >The Guardian
There's great beauty here, but, as with The Secret Migration's horrid sleeve, the sense that things have been pared down slightly too far suggests Mercury Rev still suffer from an inability to tell indulgence and exploration apart.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times
There is undeniable sweep to these 13 understated tracks, a modern psychedelic current that is lush, ominous and lovely. [22 May 2005]
Q Magazine
The Secret Migration shows a group in complete control of their cosmic idiom, familiar by now yet still seductive. [Jan 2005, p.120]
Dot Music
As with previous LPs, “The Secret Migration” works as a set-piece but, with the strings kept on a tighter leash and the production less fulsome, it’s easier to notice the details.
Read Full Review >ShakingThrough.net
The Secret Migration is a beautiful-sounding record, but Deserter's Songs managed to sound spectacular and still work in adventurous detours.
Read Full Review >Dusted Magazine
Ultimately, nobody's likely to claim The Secret Migration as a great album, I'm afraid. But it possesses energy and inspiration that its predecessor greatly lacked, and even the weaker songs here have something to recommend.
Read Full Review >Rolling Stone
The Secret Migration seethes with life and loveliness, building on the beauty of Dream and 1998's Deserter's Songs but steering clear of the dark overtones on those albums.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly
Much of the CD's faux poetry... sounds like the work of a New Age band. [20 May 2005, p.75]
Neumu.net
In stripping things back Mercury Rev suggest that in their case more actually was more, that bereft of the digressions and expansions they're just another band with a nasal, naïve-sounding singer, a way with a hook and a penchant for using the studio as an instrument.
Read Full Review >Blender
The Secret Migration comes dangerously close to being just another Mercury Rev album, and they're too inspired for such a mundane fate. [Jun 2005, p.112]
Lost At Sea
The Secret Migration has the power to cast a spell over you with its dreamy, wraithlike keyboards. Many won't fall for it, though, and will undoubtedly find them too melodramatic.
Read Full Review >Under The Radar
For the first time, [Donahue's] writing is almost completely free of existential flourishes, and the naked sentimentality and heartfelt declarations of love are a bit too cloying and pedestrian. [#9]
New Musical Express
If there's a problem, it's that... it all sounds rather familiar and comfortable. [22 Jan 2005, p.51]
Drowned In Sound
The Secret Migration is a wonderful record, full of exquisite indie-rock epics. But so was the last Mercury Rev record. And the one before that. So what’s changed? Nothing, basically.
Read Full Review >cokemachineglow
This band simply isn’t the same without a little darkness to balance the overwhelming light, and rarely do the songs pick up the slack.
Read Full Review >Pitchfork
With The Secret Migration, the band completely deserts the peculiarities that distinguished them from both peers and progeny in favor of a dull collection of pastoral fantasias that frequently wander dangerously close to adult contemporary.
Read Full Review >Slant Magazine
Where once we got shivers up our spines from this band's music, now we're just left cold.
Read Full Review >All Music Guide
The Secret Migration is oddly too conventional and too quirky; it's another paradox that this album, which in its own way is Mercury Rev's happiest album, is also, sadly, the weakest of their career.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this album is 7.4 (out of 10) based on 27 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
luna luna gave it a5:
Sad to give it a 5. I had great expectations for this album after their superior musical succes with Deserter's Song's and underpraised All is Dream but after listening to what their music came to, i was totally disappointed.The quality of this album is way below than maybe even anything the band has done so far.Just a few songs were bearable while being aware of what actually the band could have serve.Just an ordinary album.
matt a gave it a6:
Sachin P, c'mon. Even if this album was exceptional and one of the year's best (which is isn't by a long shot) it still wouldn't be one of the greatest albums ever made. Blood on the Tracks, Exile on Main St. , The White Album, Secret Migration.......see, it doesn't work. Needless to say, disappointing album, definitely their weakest to date. The 75 really is generous and it is that high probably just because this is a Mercury Rev cd and so the critics give it the benefit of the doubt. Super Furry Animals, Go-betweens, and especially Sleater Kinney also got that special treatement this year with all of them turning in very mediocre at best outings.
sachin p gave it a10:
one of the best albums of all time.
G D gave it a7:
I still think they sound like Supertramp.
d MaRioN gave it a10:
This band is amazing!!
Nick gave it a5:
disappointing and predictable, not a patch on Deserter's, no discernibly great lyrics, no screeching bowed saw or powerful guitars, dull....
Mad Dog gave it an8:
Nice work, beautifully produced, but oddly familiar. I dont' just refer to earlier Rev works, but take a listen to the one of the best forgotten bands of the 1970's, Pavlov's Dog.
