Year In The Kingdom

Though the sound remains dreamy, it's expansive; the melodic songs have a feeling of joy. [Oct 2009, p.101]

As Year in the Kingdom moves along, beautifully and without a misstep, you can imagine that crowded reunion downstairs from Tillman.

Fleet Foxes fans will relish “There is No Good in Me,” in which Tillman’s penitent voice melts into what sounds like a processional march by a cathedral choir. But it’s the celestial title track that lingers like an angel’s vapor trail.

Tillman's intimate, close-miced voice, does lend Year in the Kingdom a lonesome, somber tone, one Tillman-- a funny, amicable dude, if you've ever heard him clowning on himself at a Fleet Foxes gig-- would do well to shake on occasion. Next time, maybe; for now, the stout, supine Year in the Kingdom, Tillman's second fine record of the year, will certainly do.

Year in the Kingdom suggests whatever band he’s drumming for is ultimately inconsequential; this backwoods wanderer seems fully capable of detailing his wreckage on his own.

Quietly confessional and ever so slightly disturbing. [Oct 2009, p.117]

The pulse never rises above a heartbeat, but as the nine songs clock in at 34 minutes, the absence of tempo changes is barely noticed. [Oct 2009, p.112]

Music that's built more around the image earnest and honesty than musicality can definitely be a powerful thing, but that's just the problem: It's either powerful or it's not. On Year in the Kindgom, J. Tillman is either a soothsaying troubdaour, or he's not.

The songs are slower than a Warhol flick, and Tillman's quavering, dirgelike vocals become a navel-gazing bore.