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Jun 24, 2016Not everything works--“California” succumbs to a kind of spare, thudding aimlessness, as though the track wasn’t sure what to include and what to lose--but overall, this is DJ Shadow’s best work since his early-aughts heyday.
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Q MagazineJun 29, 2016It won't dethrone Endtroducing... from the pantheon but at last Davis has rediscovered the hidden door to that entrancing night-time world. [Aug 2016, p.111]
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Jun 24, 2016The Mountain Will Fall utilizes a wealth of live performances and ingenious programming to create an album that’s funky, futuristic, and thrilling for new fans and old heads alike.
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Jun 23, 2016Once the onslaught of ideas becomes less disorienting, however, it just feels impressive in its inventiveness.
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Jun 20, 2016The methods have changed but Shadow's unorthodox sense of rhythm remains reassuringly familiar.
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Aug 4, 2016The Mountain Will Fall is DJ Shadow's best album in over a decade, largely because it is his most consistent since "The Private Press."
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Jul 20, 2016There's a slow burn to many of the tracks, movements building like waves, and when they crash, it's glorious. When they fail to, it's all the more frustrating. But those high points are as high as any artist alive.
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Jun 27, 2016Shadow's beats programming remains formidable, as he steers clear of standard bangers in favor of something far more difficult to pin down. This isn't an album built for dancing. It's more about its rhythmic intricacy, a master class for connoisseurs of nuanced production.
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Jul 13, 2016It still stands tonally a much stronger package than his last two releases and is filled with far more highs than lows.
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Jun 24, 2016The Mountain Will Fall is only somewhat transcendent in its quiet moments, and the highs are too few and ephemeral. It’s quaint--a step away from the zeitgeist, but not quite future enough.
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Jun 24, 2016Some moments are so bleak that they could be titled descriptively as "What Does Your Witch House Look Like, Pts. 1-2," yet the whole thing sounds like it was created in a state of fevered inspiration.
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Jun 22, 2016DJ Shadow's solid fifth LP shows that he still has the chops to cut a good record when he's not doing a complete gear change (The Outsider) and then turning down the wrong road at full speed (The Less You Know, the Better).
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UncutJun 21, 2016He's hit the sweet spot between fresh and the familiar. [Aug 2016, p.83]
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Jun 20, 2016The repetition of the word “mambo” over another messy beat fails to do much. There’s too much going on to really make much sense of what’s happening. Shadow quickly makes up for that with two of the most alluring tracks on the record. “Ashes To Oceans” features British jazz composer and trumpeter Matthew Halsall, providing a gorgeous contribution to the already haunting composition. On “Pitter Patter,” rain-fall piano notes permeate the track while producer Bleep Bloop and Nite School Klik associate/trap producer G Jones give it an ethereal feel.
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Jun 27, 2016Far from aiming for some grand unified statement, The Mountain Will Fall feels a lot more like a DJ set--a curated grab bag of ideas that overlap and collide, sometimes in unexpected ways.
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Jun 24, 2016Though The Mountain Will Fall cannot be considered a failure by any means, it does continue the trend of his recent work being left firmly in the shadow of his past.
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Jul 5, 2016What the record lacks in the main part is a sense of urgency and excitement. Too often the songs wash over you, making no serious appeal for your heart or mind.
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MojoJun 28, 2016With more hits than misses, Shadow is back in the frame. [Aug 2016, p.95]
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Jun 27, 2016It broadly makes for a winning reboot, from the old-skool hip-hop stylings of The Sideshow and the urgency of Nobody Speak, a collaboration with Run the Jewels, to the more menacing atmosphere of Depth Charge and the jazz inflections of Ashes to Oceans. It’s not without its longueurs, however.
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Jun 20, 2016There are a few tracks (including the two straight-ahead rap tunes and haunting closer ‘Suicide Pact’) where he does actually let the groove unfold naturally, but that just makes even more frustratingly clear how much better the rest of this record could be if only Shadow would just ease off on the tinkering and fidgeting.
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Jun 28, 2016Some of Davis's early records still sound exciting because of the raw talent and vision behind them, and because of the way he stitched together the threads of old songs into captivating new ones. Now, his music sounds bland, as if it was designed for chillout compilations or cocktail lounges.
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Aug 9, 2016What’s most frustrating about The Mountain Will Fall is how amateur the whole thing sounds.
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Jun 24, 2016While there’s a certain amount of showmanship--he’s certainly still got skills--more often than not it sounds like he’s simply going through the motions.
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Jun 23, 2016There’s a dispiriting aridity about The Mountain Will Fall, which lacks the joyous eclecticism of DJ Shadow’s earlier albums.
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Jun 22, 2016The Mountain Will Fall is just slack, with perfunctory ideas waiting impatiently for guest stars to enliven them through association.
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Jun 21, 2016The Mountain Will Fall sounds, at best, like a decent mixtape made by someone with pretty good taste. Thing is, you can probably make one of those yourself.