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Jun 5, 2015In Colour is neither a faithful regurgitation nor a distasteful bastardization of the past, but is instead a charming, effective attempt at bridging the gap between the two.
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Jun 18, 2015As it moves from reflective to engaging and back again, In Colour covers the entire spectrum of Jamie xx's music, delivering flashes of brilliance along the way.
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Jun 25, 2015While the tale and methods of In Colour are well-worn, Jamie XX, like Burial and Four Tet before him, proves himself a master storyteller.
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Jun 8, 2015Jamie xx is among other U.K. electronic-dance acts, such as Disclosure and Four Tet, that are tapping the genre's past to forge its future. But no one has nailed it quite like this.
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Jun 3, 2015Jamie XX has rearticulated dance music once again. This is an album that surfs from one emotional peak to the next. It’s an album I was actually sad to have end.
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Jun 1, 2015It’s refreshing to hear Jamie xx go so widescreen.
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Jun 1, 2015An emotive, emphatic and often joyous collection of music that plays equally for the head and the heart.
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Jul 14, 2015A modern pop echo chamber, In Colour pushes the pleasure principle with ease, intelligence, grace, and a myriad of reflections that become one spectrum. RIYL: anything.
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May 27, 2015It may seem dismissive to write the album off as a stepping stone, but when you consider the stark contrast between tracks like the gospel leanings of "I Know There's Gonna Be (Good Times)" and, say, "Basic Space," In Colour isn't only a necessary listen, but an important one too.
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May 26, 2015After one listen or 10, In Colour reflects brightly, a phenomenally poised and universally approachable solo debut.
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Jun 1, 2015A showcase of his ability and the things he loves most (Romy and Oliver Sim’s guest spots are a vital part of the LP), it’s the most confident he’s ever sounded.
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May 26, 2015In Colour stands tall as a bold and renewably-exciting triumph.
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Jun 1, 2015Its 42 minutes are comparatively modest, sure, but there’s no question that the man behind the boards here has his finger on the pulse of what may be missing most in electronic music right now--a central reference point. In Colour is that star, the record to hold everyone else’s narratives together.
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Jun 10, 2015Those looking for an album which actively engages the future of music while remembering the imperfect past has much to enjoy with In Colour.
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Jun 1, 2015Jamie xx proves adept at exploring the intersection of hip hop, Jamaican dub music, strange New York post-disco, British grime music and gritty new-era rhythm and blues.
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Jun 8, 2015Underneath it all is a specificity of sound that threads all of the album's tracks together like beads on a string. [No. 121, p.55]
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May 27, 2015More than a simple change in direction, this debut album feels like the culmination of pretty much everything he's done up to this point in his career.
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MojoJun 10, 2015In Colour really comes into its own when Jamie xx gets abstract and confounding; where his ability to conjure something wonderful from mosaic, non-linear paths is most evident. [Jul 2015, p.84]
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Jun 1, 2015It doesn’t always maintain the consistency that makes a truly great album, but it makes you feel good and puts a smile on your face. Just as the cover promised.
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May 26, 2015Less has always been more with Smith, and the success of In Colour lies in his gift for melding together very few elements to create songs that are original, surprising and highly effective.
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Jun 4, 2015In Colour is one of the best albums of 2015 and one of the best dance albums in recent memory, simultaneously a moving homage to London rave culture and a realization of the potential of one of the most exciting and original minds in music today.
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May 28, 2015It opens with the aggressive, heady breakbeats of Gosh, and segues into songs heavy on his signature steel pans and clean productions that are sometimes dull in their tidy minimalism but ultimately contribute to a wistful atmosphere that's Smith's own.
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Jun 1, 2015It’s the dazzling culmination of Jamie xx’s last six years of work, gathering up elements of everything he’s done--moody ballads, floor-filling bangers, expansive and off-kilter collaborations with vocalists--and packing them tightly into a glittering ball that reflects spinning fragments of feeling back at us.
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Jun 2, 2015On the whole, In Color is a vibrant, warm distillation of Jamie xx’s genre-spanning influences, one which could easily result in a meteoric rise in his profile.
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May 27, 2015A collection of emotionally evocative soundscapes punctuated by more conventionally structured compositions.... It's an ear candy confection of the highest order.
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Q MagazineMay 28, 2015An album so rich, complex and dazzlingly fluid. [Jul 2015, p.103]
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May 26, 2015The album manages to transcend genre, but never once feels disjointed. Any mis-steps are quickly developed into something bigger, and no single noise ever outstays its welcome.
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Jun 2, 2015What Joni Mitchell's "Woodstock" was to the hippie era, Jamie xx's solo debut is to British club culture: a wistful valentine conjuring a more innocent time.
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Jun 2, 2015It is exceedingly rare to find a producer who does so much, with so little, that he distilled from, again, so much.
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Jun 1, 2015It remodels slabs of wax in a way that not only acknowledges but embraces the pop potential those snippets of sound have been denied for so long.
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Jun 2, 2015True, a few tracks will bore the casual listener by hewing too closely to standard house music. For the most part, however, Jamie xx’s probing of the past produces some intriguingly useful parts for an intimate style of electronica that is all his own.
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May 28, 2015Although In Colour flirts with being overly tasteful, it usually manages to stay just the right side of strange--much like the xx themselves.
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May 29, 2015This isn’t dewy eyed nostalgia all weighed down with rose tinted reverence, though: he makes a respectful nod to the past by rifling through jungle and garage and so on, but each track feels like a poignant and yet propulsive reflection of Jamie’s personality and experiences.
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May 26, 2015In Colour is no mere sepia-tinted nostalgia trip.... it is also about the pleasure of being alone, enveloped in bass, in a sea of many; of refracting what can often be a superficial experience--London clubbing--into something more existential, more nuanced, more unified.
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UncutMay 28, 2015What In Colour reveals is the sheer scope of Smith's skills as a songwriter and producer. [Jul 2015, p.68]
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May 26, 2015In Colour consistently feels cohesive and directed. [Apr-May 2015, p.83]
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 333 out of 366
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Mixed: 23 out of 366
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Negative: 10 out of 366
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Jun 2, 2015
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Jun 2, 2015
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Jun 3, 2015