Down In Albion
- Babyshambles
- Band Name: Babyshambles
- Record Label: Rough Trade
- Release Date: Feb 14, 2006
- Critic Score
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80A shockingly good batch of rock, pop and punk tunes.
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It's a messy, sometimes insane CD... [but it's] mysterious and subtly seductive. [8 Dec 2005]
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80OK, but is it as good as Up The Bracket? Naw, but it's better than last year's The Libertines.
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77In parts, Albion's shambolism is stunning, but that's no excuse for moments of total sloppiness.
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There's a 10 out of 10 album that's been thrown away here; as it is, it's the best demo you'll hear all year. [12 Nov 2005, p.41]
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67Producer Mick Jones does his best to juice up these almost-songs. [Jan 2006, p.91]
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It is a measure of Albion's strengths that it can make itself heard above the crumpy distortion and shrill feedback generated by its author.
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60Many of The Libertines' finer qualities are made all too apparent in their absence on "Down In Albion", none quite so painfully as Carl Barat's Django Reinhardt via Johnny Marr charm with a guitar.
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A beguiling, infuriating mess. [26 Jan 2006, p.55]
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60Much like its maker, the album stumbles from peak to trough, testing the listener's patience while retaining its eccentric charm.
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50Even the strongest songs... are hobbled by sickly vocals and Mick Jones's pallid, needle-thin production. [Mar 2006, p.109]
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Even within the album's murkiness, however, hints of the promise and intermittent brilliance Doherty had in the Libertines can still be heard.
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50A frustratingly half-assed album, full of great ideas executed in the poorest way possible.
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50An erratic mix of messy ambition and indifferent sloppiness that sounds like it's falling apart even before it really has a chance to get it together. [11 Feb 2006]
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It sounds like The Zutons trying to record one of their more out-there b-sides having just lost the ability to play music.
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40A frustrating listen. [Jan 2006, p.119]
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40A self-indulgent but sporadically compelling mess. [Jan 2006, p.102]
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40There is something dispiriting about trawling through so many songs which show glimpses of lucidity, even brilliance, but always seem to either nod off or descend into chaos by the end. [Jan 2006, p.120]
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Mostly, this record is yet another reason to wish that people with real talent would stop throwing it away.
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40There's too much that should have never seen the light of day, that is little more than a band riffing on ideas in the studio without ever taking them anywhere near consummation. But Down In Albion just about remains afloat because there are moments on it when Babyshambles make us care.
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36This is a brutal disappointment. [#19, p.97]
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20'Down in Albion' is a truly abhorrent and occasionally upsetting record.
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User score distribution:
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Positive: 65 out of 84
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Mixed: 3 out of 84
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Negative: 16 out of 84
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JamesC6Flashes of genius, but definitely lacking any kind of structure. Nonetheless, the good songs far out weigh the many duds on this album.
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6
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KieranS9