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Oct 17, 2022Skullcrusher’s first album may not present a doormat saying ‘welcome’ in bold letters, but it presents one of the most rewarding sonic experiences of the year for those willing to open its undefined doors.
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Oct 14, 2022Ballentine has shed the veil of her peers’ convention here entirely, creating something quietly uncompromising, unflinchingly strange, and otherworldly. It’s beautiful, moving, and utterly beguiling.
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Oct 17, 2022Quiet the Room is a worthy addition comparable to Julianna Barwick's The Magic Place and The Innocence Mission's We Walked in Song, chamber folk reveries so entrenched in their own little worlds you can practically live inside them.
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Oct 14, 2022A record that establishes Ballentine as a clear-eyed truth-teller, with poignant songs that move relentlessly as she revisits cobwebbed childhood nightmares and the dark shadow of familial trauma.
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Oct 13, 2022With this near-mystical storytelling ‘Quiet The Room’ leans heavily on folk, yet in style it embodies something entirely different. Seemingly on the edge of collapse, it tells a fraught tale of fragile memories that exist on the very brink of reality.
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Oct 13, 2022Quiet The Room is the perfect introduction to Helen Ballentine’s hazy, dreamy world – a world you’ll want to spend an awful lot of time in once you experience it.
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Oct 18, 2022As fleeting an experience as this is, it’s still emotionally moving and deeply affecting. Within its ambition, and for those who are open to its fainting beauty, it contains entire worlds.
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Oct 20, 2022Ballentine’s strengths are most apparent in the feel of this album, which is consistently rich and gauzy. Even the clearest acoustic guitar licks are somehow buried beneath a persistent field of sustain and mild distortion.
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Oct 13, 2022Despite its often-startling beauty, Ballentine’s songwriting can’t help but feel derivative at times. ... Still, Quiet the Room isn’t without its unique charms—the ominous drones of “Lullaby in February” cast indie folk into the gloomy depths of dark ambient—and Ballentine offers copious moments of hushed self-reflection and aching sadness.
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Oct 13, 2022While some of the record's lyrics are lost in ambiance, Ballentine's ethereal vocals are a key component of an artful sound design that, like a movie, is optimized in its full-length context.
User score distribution:
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Positive: 3 out of 8
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Mixed: 5 out of 8
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Negative: 0 out of 8
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Jun 14, 2023
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Oct 26, 2022