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Apr 6, 2020The album's title is repeated across the variegated yet flowing sequence, utilized as either a mantra or verbal spackle, always in tribute. Just as moving is Thundercat's heart-in-throat salutation in the closing title track, briefly stated just before his bass intertwines with Pedro Martins' guitar to gorgeous effect. As on the earlier Thundercat LPs, outer space and homeboy escapades, comic courtship and elusive companionship, and philosophical insights also inform the material. ... There are no throwaways or novelty tunes.
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Apr 2, 2020A spectacular followup to 2017's critically acclaimed Drunk. ... It Is What It Is manifests as a beautiful ebb and flow of emotional states, philosophical musings and plain old comedy. It doesn't drown itself in existential dread or proffer any clear-cut solutions, but just exists on its own plane.
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Apr 1, 2020The weight of loss, the pain of failed love, the bleakness of it all, combined with Thundercats effervescent playing, unique playfulness and a giddy sense of humor combine on It Is What It Is, resulting in the best album of Brunner’s career and one of the strongest of 2020.
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UncutMar 31, 2020From funk struts to tender touches, Thundercat's ascension continues rapidly here. [May 2020, p.35]
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Apr 8, 2020Bruner’s playing—and, increasingly, his writing as well—is so distinctive he’s able to own it even as he tones down his outsize personality. Many modern artists have mined these sounds, but few have honored them quite like Bruner does on It Is What It Is.
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Mar 31, 2020On It Is What It Is, Stephen Bruner’s eccentric hyperactivity is on full display, bouncing from jittery bass chops to fat West Coast funk. He balances the spacey jazz fusion of his early records with the signature neo-yacht rock perfected on Drunk (2017).
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The WireApr 28, 2020It Is What It Is is a fitting ethos for an artist whose genre-twisting tendrils have extended themselves into the highest reaches of the pop canopy, simultaneously flexing their deep funk and jazz roots. [May 2020, p.62]
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Apr 15, 2020On It Is What It Is, Bruner—unlike Pastorious—finds a way out, channeling his pain into great, uplifting art.
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Apr 14, 2020It Is What It Is isn’t the worthy successor to Drunk, but it certainly feels like its ideal companion piece.
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Apr 13, 2020Emotionally and musically, he has kept pushing forward on this new record.
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Apr 8, 2020Fortunately, It Is What It Is takes the listener’s needs into consideration by counteracting giddy one-liners heightened by energetic accompaniments with introspective ruminations coupled woven into sultry arrangements. In adjusting to the shifting sonic plains, the listener is presented with a gloriously rewarding stretch of tonal stability in the record’s third act.
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Q MagazineApr 7, 2020Soft soul, gibbering jazz fusion and the cyber-futurism of overseer Flying Lotus still works a collective shock. [Jun 2020, p.96]
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Apr 6, 2020The LP’s darker moments are its most affecting, but the playful brushes of humour throughout never diminish anything; in fact, they make ‘It Is What It Is’ a richer, more human experience.
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Apr 3, 2020It Is What It Is sparkles with inventive songwriting, chunky production and pervasive good vibes, a worthwhile addition to any R&B or jazz fan’s collection.
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Apr 2, 2020The album’s stoic title aside, Thundercat’s lyrical reflections on grief, uncertainty and gradual healing are threaded through ‘It Is What It Is’. ... ‘It Is What It Is’ isn’t entirely shrouded in mourning at every turn though: there’s ample fun and musical exuberance here.
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Apr 1, 2020It’s an album embracing difference, accepting highs and lows: just what we need right now.
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Apr 1, 2020What’s impressive is how Thundercat makes this music, with its complex structures and zigzagging rhythms, so human.
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MojoMar 31, 2020The musical and emotional ground covered here is remarkable, evidence of an artist who can locate joy inside pain, and whose adventurous, modernist, fearful funk can be movingly expressive. [May 2020, p.88]
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Mar 31, 2020As usual Flying Lotus produces, with his fingerprints particularly keenly felt on tracks such as Unrequited Love, to assist Bruner with yet another fantastic release.
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Apr 7, 2020Thundercat has a giant heart, and It Is What It Is is the best display of his enormous empathy yet, even if it does have a few unnecessary goofs along the way.
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Apr 7, 2020Bruner is still getting tipsy and pondering what waits for us in the beyond. There’s growth and acceptance in that wonder—the title suggests as much— but not necessarily in the songwriting. The album lacks the anchoring power of a full-bodied jam like “Them Changes,” “Heartbreaks + Setbacks,” or even his 2011 George Duke cover “For Love I Come,” leaving us lost inside Bruner’s mind. hat isn’t always a bad place to be.
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Apr 7, 2020It Is What It Is, is just as daring in its musical reach, and its pairing of goofy and gutting [as 2017's Drunk].
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Apr 6, 2020The drawback here is not that Bruner hasn’t made the out-and-out pop album his narrative arc as an artist might demand. Nor is it that he is showcasing his conservatoire-grade talents. It is, perhaps, that he doesn’t sit with one emotion, be it high or low, for a sustained length of time.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 56 out of 68
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Mixed: 9 out of 68
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Negative: 3 out of 68
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Apr 4, 2020
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Apr 3, 2020
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Apr 3, 2020