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Jun 8, 2023It’s a delicious amount of fun and presumably would’ve felt like a treat had it arrived any time of year — but for The Age of Pleasure to become available just as summer truly begins to heat up feels intentional.
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Jun 16, 2023There’s plenty of intricacy in the intimacy of this record. In the end, though, The Age Of Pleasure is an easier ride. Less densely packed with ideas but it’s no bother.
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Jun 12, 2023Having parked her dystopian allegories, it follows that Monáe now feels a little more like an artist in a crowded partying field. But she has earned this mainstream place. Moreover, she remains distinctive.
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Jun 9, 2023Though shorter and lighter than 2018’s magnificent Dirty Computer, it delivers its full measure of pleasure. Doing just what it says on the tin, a 21st century pop peak. [Sep 2023, p.89]
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Jun 9, 2023There's joy in every moment.
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Jun 9, 2023Its 31-ish minutes are exquisitely wrought, as smoothly mixed as a top-tier set from a DJ with an infinite collection that includes Fifties doo-wop sides and cutting-edge cuts from the African diaspora.
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Jun 9, 2023If I have a caveat, it is that it is all so single minded, it lacks the dizzying splendour of Monae’s earlier epics. But on its own down and dirty terms, The Age of Pleasure is sheer pleasure.
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Jun 8, 2023Poet Toi Derricotte once wrote that joy is in fact an “act of resistance”: listening to Monáe’s liberating latest album, you start to believe that pleasure is, too.
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Jun 8, 2023Clocking in at a scant 31 minutes, you could call The Age of Pleasure a quickie – but one that more than manages to scratch that itch.
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Jun 20, 2023This album finishes right when it needs to. Any longer and there might be a genuine risk of someone having a hernia from all the physical carousing. As it is, we leave this magical island fully refreshed and filled with self satisfaction.
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Jun 9, 2023The Age of Pleasure isn’t as intricate as their sci-fi novellas or as electrifyingly innovative as The ArchAndroid. It’s a bacchanal in the haven Monáe constructed for themself, cobblestone by cobblestone, tree by tree.
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Jun 22, 2023Stuffed with a handful of sub-two-minute tracks and a few interludes, The Age of Pleasure sounds more like a short week of longing and sexual liberation, the epilogue to a coming of age story.
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UncutJul 17, 2023Spanning just 32 minutes, The Art Of Pleasure feels slight and light. Even so, the warm glow of liberated self-love on sparkly standouts like "Float", "Phenomenal" and "Haute" is infectious. [Sep 2023, p.32]
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Jun 8, 2023It might not be as cohesive as some of her earlier work but The Age Of Pleasure is still an album that bristles with energy and boldness.
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Jun 8, 2023While Monáe specializes in sprawling, ambitious concept albums, she’s often strongest in distilled form. And The Age of Pleasure sustains its energy in a way that her other, sometimes wildly variable albums have never quite managed.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 46 out of 50
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Mixed: 3 out of 50
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Negative: 1 out of 50
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Jun 9, 2023mother has returned. pronouns are they/them, she/her, and freeahhmuthaf*cka. album of the summer fr.
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Jun 9, 2023
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Jun 9, 2023