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- By date
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These are songs about horrible times in horrible lives; hearts are rotten long before they break and the sounds they make are awful and haunting and beautiful.
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Entertainment WeeklyAt times quaintly dreamy, at others spastically nightmarish. [22 Jul 2005, p.78]
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La Forêt has the sort of courage-minus-contrivance that is exceedingly (and ironically) rare in music of its dramatic and thematic ilk.
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A dark and beautiful album with true emotional resonance and weight.
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In the best possible way, the album is a painful listening experience, forcing the listener into immediate and excruciating catharsis: you look into the eyes of a cold stranger, and see nothing but ugliness and painful regret.
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It's business as usual, but there is not a damn thing wrong with that when it comes to this group.
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Even more than some of the group's other albums, La Foret seems guided by dream logic, flowing and crashing unexpectedly.
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La Forêt isn't nearly as overtly poppy as Fabulous Muscles was, but it's just as well written.
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The New York TimesNo question, it's not for everyone; it's both fey and aggressive. But it's quite real. [11 Jul 2005]
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It sounds a whole lot like you’d expect the new Xiu Xiu album to sound.
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Easy listening this amn’t, but if you want a rollercoaster ride into deep recessions and to be thrilled by the sounds that surround you, then this could be the perfect album for you.
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The WireThe mood is always unsettled and unsettling, either furious or fragile. [#258, p.67]
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MagnetLa Foret sounds like what rock might've become if all the British Invasion bands had hailed from postwar Berlin. [#69, p.112]
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La Forêt... backs off dramatically from the pop side of Fabulous Muscles to expand upon its quiet, murky dimension.
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While these experiments don't always quite work, at the very least the group isn't falling into a rut.
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This isn’t a band looking to be loved so much as it desires a swift kick in the teeth.
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Too many songs here move at a glacial pace and seem to take away from Xiu Xiu’s strength: an ear for melody, a love for dissonance, songs that go interesting places and engaging instrumentation.
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By bringing in more musical variation into the mix, Stewart has managed to keep things interesting enough again, the arrangements making his frantic outbursts more palatable than ever.
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It makes for a difficult listen but will be fulfilling for those who find their way out on the other side.
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The album relies less on hooks and more on a sparse energy, but the listening is engaging enough to keep the listener around to the end, focusing more on cohesion rather than theatrics.
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Unfortunately, the mere manufacture of unique sounds isn’t enough to rescue them on La Forêt.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 24 out of 27
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Mixed: 0 out of 27
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Negative: 3 out of 27
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DonaldHJul 12, 2005
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Aug 6, 2014
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MattOct 25, 2005