The Idler Wheel Is Wiser than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More than Ropes Will Ever Do
- Fiona Apple
- Band Name: Fiona Apple
- Record Label: Epic
- Release Date: Jun 19, 2012
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Jul 24, 201291An album that's damn catchy after all.
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Jul 18, 201295Beguiling and brilliant. [No. 89 p.51]
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Jul 10, 201290With a confectionery of similarly colored assortments, The Idler Wheel... retrenches most of her past output, whether its wistful balladeering or sultry jazz, as a means of expelling a truly uncharacteristic voice.
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Jul 2, 201290It is perhaps the most unforgettable work of her career.
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Jun 27, 201283Handsome almost in spite of itself, The Idler Wheel is poignant, nuanced and quietly unforgettable.
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Jun 25, 201287In The Idler Wheel's ten phenomenal songs, Fiona Apple seems to lay everything out on the table.
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Jun 22, 201290Another singular album from a truly idiosyncratic voice, Apple has once again invited us into her lushly conflicted inner monologue.
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Jun 19, 201284To her immense credit, Apple never flinches at such uneasy insights and insoluble contradictions, which makes The Idler Wheel a tough but rewarding listen.
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Jun 19, 201285For all the foot-stomping vitriol that seeps out here and there, The Idler Wheel... is the sound of a brilliant songwriter putting away childish things, and waiting tensely for what comes next.
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Jun 19, 201292The result is an album that was absolutely worth the seven-year wait, not to mention the mountain of hype atop which Apple has sat since her big comeback at SXSW in March.
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Jun 19, 201290Apple has been here before, but it makes her new album no less arresting.
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Jun 19, 2012100It's essential 2012 listening for anyone interested in popular music as art.
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Jun 19, 2012100The beauty of The Idler Wheel… is how it transmits each of those feelings in excruciating, frank, and lovely detail.
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Jun 19, 201288Her fourth album is arguably her funniest ... but also her leanest and most melodically daring.
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Jun 18, 201290"Left Alone" is nothing short of a vocal masterclass. It has the singer going from the verses' rap-like cadence to the hook's curlicue jazz stylings to the operatic long notes of the bridge-- notes that slowly curdle underneath their own exasperated weariness.
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Jun 18, 201290The Idler Wheel succeeds in creating a singular world more daring than any of Apple's previous records and one of the most daring pop records in recent history.
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Jun 18, 201288It makes for a raw, unsettling listen, tempered by shots of dark humor.
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Jun 15, 201290It is punchy, vibrant, compelling stuff.
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Jun 15, 201290The Idler Wheel… is a really incredible album, where Apple has quite cleverly developed musically in just the right way, creating something utterly distinct and different to her earlier work whilst still retaining all the characteristics that won fans over to begin with.
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Jun 15, 2012100It isn't easy listening. But it's worth it.
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Jun 15, 201290Stripped of all her carnivalesque accouterments, Fiona Apple remains as rich and compelling as she ever was, perhaps even more so.