| 100 |
PopMatters
This is the kind of beautiful album that Reed knows he can make in his sleep yet seldom does.
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| 80 |
CDNow
Vintage Reed?
|
| 80 |
Billboard
"Ecstasy" finds 58-year-old rock poet Lou Reed characteristically fixing his gaze on messier thoughts and murkier emotions -- and doing so more artfully than at any time since his 1989 masterpiece, "New York."
|
| 80 |
HOB.com
In twelve brutally honest and dark tracks, Reed revisits the best elements of his early work...
|
| 80 |
Rolling Stone
Understandably, Reed's old fascination with sadomasochistic transcendence puts off those who don't swing that way at least a little. But the music on this record, its gorgeous part, could change that.
|
| 78 |
Wall of Sound
Reed has lost neither his lyrical bite nor his sonic perfectionism.
|
| 70 |
New Musical Express
The main criticism of this record is that a few tracks are merely good, as opposed to epochal.
|
| 70 |
Checkout.com
Though Ecstasy is gruesome, fearsome and rife with realism much in the same way as his heart-stopping shocker, Berlin (1973), Reed has a compelling way with words, and a magic touch with psycho-delic guitar riffs that dare us to follow him down the back alleys to his darkest thoughts.
|
| 70 |
Puncture
Hardly surprising to find some dross here, I suppose, since the whole thing clocks in at 77 minutes, 26 seconds. For those willing to make their own "best of" tape, through, Ecsatsy has a lot to offer. [#46, p.33]
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| 65 |
Pitchfork
While Ecstasy is essentially a concept album about the fantasies and realities of love and family, it includes as much sex, drugs, and rock n' roll culture as any of Reed's earlier work.
|
| 60 |
Mojo
Ecstasy is definitely a Lou Reed record for Lou Reed fans. If you're a happy regular shopper at Lou's Boutique, this one'll fit nicely on the shelf alongside all the others.
|
| 60 |
Sonicnet
There are more flashes of the old White Light/White Heat Reed than the old crank has provided even diehard loyalists in years.
|
| 60 |
Nude As The News
The best record Lou Reed has made in a long time.
|
| 60 |
All Music Guide
Reed genuinely seems to be stretching towards new lyrical and musical ground here, but while some of his experiments work, several pointedly do not?
|
| 50 |
Dot Music
So there it is, bizarre, world-weary, beautiful, touching, self-indulgent but never, never dull ? at least not until at least nine minutes into 'Like A Possum'.
|
| 50 |
The Onion (A.V. Club)
As uneven an album as Reed has released, it might be easier to take if there had been more of them in the past seven or eight years. Instead, it feels like the latest in a series of anticlimaxes.
|
| 40 |
Spin
Signature oh-so-mellow, mumblin' beat, only this time with just too much remove and far too little energy to make it work.
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