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While The Grey Album is truly one of the more interesting pirate mashups ever done, it ultimately fails at the hands of perfectionism with several pieces sounding rushed to beat some other knucklehead to his clever idea.
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Q Magazine[Makes] two known quantities thrillingly new. [May 2004, p.101]
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For what it is, for what it does, for what it represents and for exposing the idiocy of people who only care about 'what it earns us', then, a truly, TRULY great pop record.
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SpinWhile the novelty factor alone makes it worth the download time, it works as a cohesive album long after the initial shock wears off. [Apr 2004, p.91]
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Entertainment WeeklyA startlingly, shockingly wonderful piece of pop art. [19 Mar 2004, p.64]
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There are certainly more fun moments than not, at the very least rendering The Grey Album enjoyable, but its hard to argue for any reason other than its novelty.
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Dangermouse's actions have breathed creative life back into a 35-year-old record while inventing a completely new work of hip-hop art.
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The WireOne of the year's best releases, remix or not. [#241, p.71]
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He can't seem to decide whether he wants to make a straightforward hip-hop remix of Jay-Z's tunes, quirky sampladelia like DJ Steinski or Coldcut, or an avant-garde project in the vein of plunderphonic composers John Oswald and Negativland. A lot of the time, he falls awkwardly between the three camps.
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The Grey Album isnt much more than a well-executed novelty, nor does it illuminate some genius hidden deep within The Black Album.
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The diversity of the mixes on The Grey Album also is a testament to how carefully Danger Mouse has cut and pasted together his unauthorized sonic pastiche.
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UrbThis'll retain its heat only until everyone's heard it. [Apr 2004, p.88]
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Of course it's a gimmick, but about half of it works anyway.
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The Beatles don't meet Jay-Z as equals; they're sliced and diced, the innate musicality of their work all but compromised into nothingness, into vaguely familiar square pegs crammed into the comparatively round holes of Jay-Z's original vocals.
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Each of the 12 tracks on the Grey Album is finely tuned -- the precision cut-and-paste sampling DM exhibits is often mind-blowing.
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The concept does start to wear thin towards the end of the CD, and the recontextualized product is inherently one sided: it's the Beatles' soundtrack that is made to dance around Jay-Z's unedited verses.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 41 out of 47
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Mixed: 0 out of 47
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Negative: 6 out of 47
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Apr 28, 2021
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GMoneyJul 20, 2009
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AnonY.Apr 30, 2009