- Critic score
- Publication
- By date
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A promising first effort that suffers from retro fever.
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Q MagazineThe Australian quartet's debut album justifies the fuss that followed its title track's bubblegum approximation of Nirvana. [July 2002, p.121]
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43 minutes of thrills.
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The album definitely has a few remarkable moments, but its really just not very good.
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A strange mix of songs that, while varied, doesn't boast much personality of its own.
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BlenderIf you're this good, it's not hype. [#8, p.126]
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The Vines get credit for ambition, but Highly Evolved covers so much ground that none of it seems convincing: there's just no emotional depth here.
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The record's big-rock sound works against it, as does its back-and-forth swing from melodic Britpop to room-filling volume.
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Alternative PressIt's rare for a band to channel the Velvet Underground, Nirvana, Dandy Warhols and the Beatles within the span of 45 minutes and sound unique, but the Vines have crept into that select category with Highly Evolved. [Aug 2002, p.86]
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The Vines have trouble faking both the depth of feeling and the noisome mischief that good garage-punk requires, and the two rote Britpop numbers they tack on don't help.
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For as good as the majority of the tunes here are, the grandiose scope of Highly Evolved turns out to be a bit more than the young quartet could chew.
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Unlike many other pop postmodernists, the Vines never sound weighed down by all the influences they include in their music -- it's as if they're so excited by everything they hear, they can't help but recombine it in unique ways.
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UncutThe Vines' place in the rock gene pool is shaped by elements of controlled guitar thrash, often complex harmony, bubblegum psychedelia and polished piano-driven ballads with an early Seventies whiff. [Aug 2002, p.116]
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OK, so it tails off towards the end, and there's something rather dishonest about a band so young releasing a track like '1969', but even then it's quite endearing to see them trying to build such an immediate mythology around themselves.
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Theyre a shaggy-haired, surfs up pop band and painfully vulnerable all at the same time.
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Highly Evolved is clunkiest on long, drawn-out stuff like "Homesick" and "Country Yard," but singer Craig Nicholls has most of Kurt Cobain's shrieking mannerisms down, and, like most grunge, the band's simple three-chord rock is most exciting when played extremely fast.
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It's hard to figure out exactly why everybody is so excited about this record.... There is something there to like -- plenty, in fact. But it is also disjointed and sometimes maddening.
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As a debut album, 'Highly Evolved', for all its faults, can be an energising proposition.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 45 out of 50
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Mixed: 1 out of 50
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Negative: 4 out of 50
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Aug 28, 2014
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Jun 28, 2012
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Mar 26, 2020