Buy Now
- Critic score
- Publication
- By date
-
Oct 12, 2015With Half Free, Remy has made a brilliant, accessible, edgy pop record without compromising her ideals one iota--and hopefully has surreptitiously brought her into a wider light.
-
The WireOct 8, 2015The cleaner production of Half Free ups the anxiety. [Oct 2015, p.58]
-
Oct 6, 2015The record is a veritable patchwork of perspectives. It elevates the voices of women who, on paper, might seem broken, were it not for Remy’s ability to trade desperation for cynical dynamism.
-
Oct 1, 2015A fifth album that offers, well, more of the same.
-
Oct 1, 2015Half Free is both a revelation and a breakthrough, one that finds Remy elevating her songwriting panache while carrying a certain mysticism that seems grounded in both plausibility and commonality.
-
Sep 30, 2015Over and over, listen after listen and Half Free just plain sends. Mastermind Meg Remy’s first album for the vaunted 4AD label is bursting with vivid, cracked imagination and cool mastery of slippery pop allure.
-
Sep 29, 2015Chirping Half Free‘s most compelling of its many indelible hooks, she tries to convince whoever listens “You all have nothing here / You have so much to fear”. An oscillator throbs at nightmare frequency.
-
Sep 28, 2015This is the unmistakeable sound of a star being born: this is an album with something to say, in a voice all of its own.
-
UncutSep 25, 2015These songs are pretty, but something intense seethes just beneath the surface. [Nov 2015, p.83]
-
Sep 23, 2015Occasionally Half Free can sound dense to the point of being vexing, but its vivid imagery and striking melodies keep Remy’s more self-indulgent tendencies grounded in a classic pop sensibility.
-
MojoSep 23, 2015Not all [are] successful, but the extent of her ambition cannot be faulted. [Oct 2015, p.90]
-
Sep 23, 2015Overall, Half Free straddles a neat balance between bittersweet pop hooks and murky, adventurous production.
-
Sep 23, 2015Granted, the guitar and sax rocker "Sed Knife" stands out for the wrong reasons — it's maybe a little too clean and straightforward given the context--but after years of flirting with the fringes, Half Free hits the art-pop bullseye.
-
Sep 23, 2015Even as its backdrop mutates from deep-house throbs to psych-rock guitar solos, Half Free always focuses your attention to where it should be: on Remy's radiant voice and vivid storytelling.
User score distribution:
-
Positive: 26 out of 29
-
Mixed: 1 out of 29
-
Negative: 2 out of 29
-
Dec 29, 2015