Buy Now
| Buy on |
|
- Critic score
- Publication
- By date
-
Mar 5, 2012If you like smart pop and are not familiar, hearing Bird for the first time will feel like discovering a new planet.
-
Mar 1, 2012It's the perfect album: tender without being sentimental, experimental yet accessible, utterly unique to its maker.
-
Mar 13, 2012It's extraordinarily intimate at times, especially given the overarching theme of heartbreak and broken connections that suffuses the album.
-
May 14, 2012Put simply, it's lovely.
-
Apr 23, 2012The 14 tracks here rank among some of the best Bird's ever done.
-
Mar 6, 2012For as much as this collection of songs feels like a band getting together to jam for fun, Break It also feels like one of the more cohesive albums in Bird's oeuvre.
-
Mar 6, 2012Though it's a lengthy record, at just over an hour, it's a rewarding one.
-
Mar 15, 2012May be his best yet.
-
Mar 5, 2012Andrew Bird is a highly skilled musician capable of crafting an album full of delightful little moments that make the album worth a fair listen, and more.
-
MagnetApr 6, 2012Packed to the brim with moments of tonal and melodic transcendence. [#86, p.51]
-
MojoMar 22, 2012It's a seductive lesson in understated beauty. [Apr 2012, p.86]
-
Mar 13, 2012It's this sort of wide-eyed optimism [heard on "Near Death Experience Experience"] that lends Break It Yourself immediate appeal.
-
Mar 9, 2012It's mood music with a melody, orchestral pop without the pomp, midwest Americana with Euro-classical training. And despite the title, it's far from broken.
-
Mar 7, 2012On first spin, Break It Yourself may sound like a typical outing, but repeated listens unveil an assembly of songs that are as verdant and mercurial as they are rooted in the Bird tradition.
-
Mar 6, 2012On his 12th official album, the 38-year-old's impressive work habits have both loosened and deepened his craft.
-
Mar 5, 2012Bird conducts his experiments with the lightest of touches: his ingenuity matched by a gift for simple, lilting melodies.
-
Mar 2, 2012A cornucopia of ideas and influences, here, Andrew Bird has created a veritable treasure trove of a record, where to equal the bare sum of its parts is a momentous achievement.
-
Mar 2, 2012Truly special.
-
Mar 1, 2012When it all comes together, with the sinuous, haunting grace of "Near Death Experience Experience" or the jaunty élan of "Danse Carribe", the results more than justify the sometimes obtuse methods.
-
Feb 28, 2012By playing it straight and singing it even straighter, he's created an intensely listenable and emotional album that's impossible not to relate to.
-
Feb 28, 2012A little patience pays dividends which, for the first time with an Andrew Bird release, are as emotional as they are cerebral.
-
Mar 6, 2012The end result then, is the sound of Bird settling down, becoming comfortable with his music and letting it come off as natural, without losing the sense of enjoyment and the hypnotic dynamism of his core elements.
-
Mar 6, 2012It all amounts to a constructed world that sounds outré at first but winds up being a startlingly astute reflection of our own as you settle into it.
-
Feb 28, 2012It's exactly the kind of album one imagines Bird could whip up on a lazy Sunday afternoon after a cat-nap.
-
Mar 20, 2012Break it Yourself dodges the feedback of erring too closely to its own sources--but not all of it soars.
-
UncutMar 14, 2012Break It Yourself by contrast [to Noble Beast] feels like an attempt to communicate more directly and is his most affecting album yet. [Apr 2012, p.82]
-
Mar 7, 2012It has flashes of musical and lyrical depth that few can match. The hooks don't quite sink in as far as some of those on past records, and the diversity doesn't quite match either, but the depth of the intelligent, philosophic experience grows after each listen.
-
Mar 6, 2012Whether contemplatively highbrow (the symphonic meditation "Hole in the Ocean Floor") or forlornly down-to-earth (the alt-country of "Fatal Shore"), his angst studies feel cathartic without seeming mean-spirited.
-
Mar 5, 2012Unlike previous efforts, which have seen Bird obscure meaning with questionable use of Scrabble-worthy vocabulary, Break It Yourself finds the Chicago-based artist writing some of his most straightforward lyrics.
-
Mar 2, 2012Whereas on another album these kinds of sidepaths would be no more than frustrating distractions, here the scenery looks so good, you'll gladly take the long way home.
-
Q MagazineMar 14, 2012Having been criticized for lacking emotional resonance with his lyrics, Bird addresses the problem [here]. Worth the wait. [April 2012, p.90]
-
Mar 6, 2012The best parts of this record recall Bird at his finest, tweaking his sound just enough to freshen it up, but unfortunately they're surrounded by too many songs that end up as pleasant background music.
-
Mar 5, 2012He's not playing to his strengths; he's succumbing to preciousness.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
-
Positive: 31 out of 32
-
Mixed: 0 out of 32
-
Negative: 1 out of 32
-
Mar 6, 2012
-
Jun 29, 2014
-
May 3, 2012