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Mar 23, 2015No doubts about this: Short Movie is a masterpiece.
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Mar 26, 2015Short Movie pines, appropriately, but it also finds ways to blast through emotional stasis. The eclectic guitar thus becomes a tool that complements Marling’s lyrics on this pivotal album, at times articulating visceral anger and, at others, obliterating psychic barriers and clearing space for something new.
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Mar 9, 2015A commanding and sincerely fascinating listen that stands tall in a catalogue already awash with magic.
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Apr 7, 2015It’s Marling’s sense of immediacy that makes Short Movie so evocative.
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Mar 20, 2015Short Movie is an introspective journey crafted into a communal experience. It’s the product of a genuine artist losing faith in herself, hitting the reset button, and returning with an intensely personal work that manages to say something about us all.
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Apr 20, 2015Most of Short Movie lingers over energetic yet contemplative sounds, which Marling then pairs with her voice, an instrument as soothing as it is commanding, and every lyric is delivered with a kind of conversational cadence that hints at a slight curl in the corners of Marling’s lips.
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Mar 27, 2015The new developments in sound and style of Marling's fifth album--and the way her leading-lady status continues to evolve--leave it as her most captivating yet. Just watch the movie and don't worry too much about the run time.
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Mar 27, 2015What Short Movie does do is remind us of the poise with which Marling carries her prodigious ability as a songwriter, and reaffirm that she’s genuinely ambitious, too; she sounds excited again, and so should we be.
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Mar 24, 2015She seldom raises her voice in anger or frustration, but imbues her words with emotional heft.
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Mar 23, 2015There is more to Short Movie’s context than odd details, avant garde references and the philosophy of hippy shamans. Marling has long been able to trace a musical lineage back to heavyweights like Neil Young and Joni Mitchell, and this is cemented here.
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Mar 23, 2015The fundamentals of her style are unchanged: the austere beauty of her singing; the grace and propulsion of her fingerpicking; the drones that underscore both Indian ragas and pensive British folk.
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Mar 23, 2015Consistently, Short Movie is wonderfully unlike anything she has ever attempted before.
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Mar 23, 2015Short Movie’s best songs are all about Marling’s ongoing voyage of self-discovery; an indulgence we not only permit musicians, but pay them for, on the condition we can listen in and pick up tips. There are plenty of those here.
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Mar 20, 2015This conflicting need for independence within affection, thrown into stark relief during her self-imposed exile, is one thematic mainspring driving this Short Movie.
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Mar 20, 2015The best stuff on Short Movie sounds like it may have originated in the most painfully personal places.
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Mar 19, 2015Short Movie feels like the work of someone who’s going to be around for a long time.
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MojoMar 19, 2015The singer-songwriter's fifth is no less over-reaching and torrid in its back-story [as 2013's Once I Was An Eagle]. [Apr 2015, p.90]
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Mar 17, 2015Often she sounds like she’s having a conversation with herself. If that sounds distancing, the honesty and intelligence behind it draws us close.
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Mar 16, 2015This is Marling at her finest, but as she’s proved five times in a row, the best is always yet to come.
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UncutMar 9, 2015Marling's fifth takes vast steps forward musically, as ever. It's more defiant and distinct than anything she's done before. [Apr 2015, p.74]
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Mar 9, 2015There's no overarching narrative to Short Movie--it plays out like a series of vignettes, of moods and moments, people and places--but there is a sense of a journey completed, with a hard-won wisdom at the end of it.
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Mar 9, 2015Short Movie stretches its cohesive motifs through all thirteen tracks, without sticking to a plot or forced narrative structure. Instead, the themes of self-reflection and search for belonging and identity move you wantonly through the album.
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Mar 25, 2015Short Movie is no epic, but it's the most replayable LP of Marling's career.
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Mar 24, 2015The best tracks showcase Marling’s ability to fuse her meandering musicality with her forceful passion.
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Mar 19, 2015Short Movie lacks the seamless thematic and tonal cohesion of Once I Was An Eagle, but it offers more immediate pleasures.
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Mar 27, 2015Without an overarching conceit like Once I Was an Eagle, Short Movie comes off sounding like a transition record, a short movie in the sense that it’s a prelude to something bigger.
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Mar 27, 2015It may lack the cohesion of her last outing, and her steadfast derision of anything resembling a hook can be taxing, but it makes up for its meandering with a strength of character that eludes many of her contemporaries.
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Mar 24, 2015It's a flash of lyrical left hooks on a set where the British singer-songwriter goes all Judas, like Dylan before her, recording with electric guitar and broadening her palette without sacrificing her subtly badass folkie persona.
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Mar 18, 2015Marling's fingerpicking still marvels, but the low blues of "Howl" and the title track's aggressive drone shade with bleaker hues.
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Apr 3, 2015At times the full band arrangements bring more muscle than we’re used to hearing from her, but songs such as Divine and the closing Worship Me are certainly in the vein of what’s come before.
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Mar 18, 2015Too much of the record lacks that song's percussive drive; all the pretty singing and unhurried tempos start to blend into a tepid listen, and the experimental near-spoken-word turn on Strange is just, well, strange.
User score distribution:
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Positive: 39 out of 48
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Mixed: 6 out of 48
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Negative: 3 out of 48
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Mar 24, 2015
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Jan 29, 2018There is a reason why this album has such great reviews. Because it is a great album!
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Apr 6, 2015