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Oct 23, 2020The music is engaging, yet thought provoking. It sounds unlike his previous three releases, but there is a continuation of ideas throughout. It’s an album from an artist who doesn’t pander to trends and goes his own path.
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Dec 1, 2020Karma & Desire is still everything we'd expect from an Actress LP—foggy, impenetrable, and deeply cerebral. The runtime may be a bit long, and some experiments may fall flat, but the best moments here showcase Cunningham at his finest.
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Oct 30, 2020As usual, Karma & Desire is a sprawling, unpredictable maze of an album, but Actress is no longer a solitary figure navigating rain-streaked streets alone. He's invited others along to zigzag with him.
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Oct 23, 2020Tracks unloading Actress trademarks like clinking and swarming FX ("Diamond X") and fitful kick-drum jabs ("Leaves Against the Sky") are more alluring and welcoming than usual. Six years after he etched a headstone for music, this enigma has made the easiest point of entry into his catalog.
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Oct 23, 2020Karma & Desire never comes close to being a dance record — it's much too opaque and fragile and weird for that. Instead, listeners are left with a longform thinkpiece that's expertly conceived, well executed and brilliantly sequenced.
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Oct 23, 2020There is a sense of nostalgia throughout, with tracks such as ‘Angels Pharmacy’ and ‘Remembrance’ featuring female vocalist Zsela giving off hazy club vibes. The turn to voice, Actress’s first time, has formed a deeper sense of worldliness, the invasion of corporal sensation into his production style.
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Oct 23, 2020By accepting the chaotic elements coexisting alongside our stark self-made structures – be it tangible, psychological or virtual – Karma & Desire might be the most honest form of pop music one can make at this moment.
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Dec 3, 2020Cunningham provides a lot to chew on with his latest release and gives no straightforward answers, much like the redacted documents featured in the short film accompaniment. One shouldn’t expect anything less from the musical enigma himself.
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Oct 30, 2020For all of its strengths, the album is somewhat let down by its monstrous length – 78 minutes, to be exact. That’s not to stay that Cunningham and his collaborators can’t hold the listener’s interest for the entire running time (they can), but that the whole experience can be overwhelming and a little draining.
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UncutNov 13, 2020Certainly it is a record of two halves, its first batch of corroded box jams smothered in hiss, including two listless cuts with Sampha. [Jan 2021, p.21]
User score distribution:
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Positive: 6 out of 13
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Mixed: 0 out of 13
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Negative: 7 out of 13
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Aug 21, 2022who tf is that worst album i have ever heard trash trash trashhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
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Aug 21, 2022