• Record Label: Mute
  • Release Date: Oct 7, 2014
Metascore
66

Generally favorable reviews - based on 21 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 13 out of 21
  2. Negative: 0 out of 21
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  1. Oct 14, 2014
    85
    This is what it sounds like when an artist matures, discovers a confidence they perhaps never knew they had, and return, revitalised.
  2. 85
    It’s that sense of balance--the epic and the intimate, the light and the shade, the coldness and the warmth--that puts Taiga in contention with Stridulum II as Zola Jesus’ best work, the purest distillation of an ever-searching soul.
  3. Oct 13, 2014
    80
    Taiga is a more mainstream album than people may be used to from Zola Jesus. But that is not a bad thing.
  4. Oct 6, 2014
    80
    It is without doubt Zola Jesus’ most heartfelt utterance to date, the emotion coming from her very bones--a case where you really can see the wood for the trees.
  5. Oct 1, 2014
    80
    She's used all the tools accrued over her career to craft an impressively versatile and sprawling goth pop album that simultaneously her most adventurous and accessible to date. [Sep/Oct 2014, p.80]
  6. Oct 1, 2014
    80
    Taiga is more of an achievement than that; it’s the mark of someone who has truly taken their time over their work. Cooped up in a friend’s holiday home in Washington, Nika Roza Danilova crafted a small slice of perfection.
  7. 75
    Taiga is better-produced and differently arranged than 2010’s “Poor Animal,” but it’s no more or less “pop.”
  8. Oct 17, 2014
    70
    Even if it's not her most intimate work, Taiga allows Nika to be inventive and craft some some stunningly beautiful moments along the way.
  9. Oct 15, 2014
    70
    When we’re not soaring we’re wrapped in ambient solemnity, all the while fixated on Nika Danilova’s voice: theatrical, confessional and, perhaps for the first time, totally unafraid.
  10. Oct 10, 2014
    70
    Taiga marks Danilova’s own internal struggle to continue to carve out her own musical path. And so far, so good.
  11. Gloomy as it is, there are some brilliant flashes of light to be found here.
  12. Oct 3, 2014
    70
    For an ambitious release that obviously reaches for such lofty heights, Taiga is peculiarly light on hooks and personality, forcing Danilova to fill many of those gaps in with glittering aural cosmetics.
  13. Magnet
    Nov 5, 2014
    65
    Most squarely accessible record to date, and easily the most pop album to come from an alumnus of Sacred Bones. [No. 114, p.61]
User Score
6.8

Generally favorable reviews- based on 26 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 19 out of 26
  2. Negative: 5 out of 26
  1. Oct 7, 2014
    8
    "Taiga" is an intimate album that sounds like Zola did for herself. The spirit of this is amazing and pass a deep thrill of nature, power,"Taiga" is an intimate album that sounds like Zola did for herself. The spirit of this is amazing and pass a deep thrill of nature, power, love and pain... Zola Jesus is amazing! Full Review »