Rating: "Electric"

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Rating: "Electric"

10
23
22%
9
50
49%
8
18
17%
7
7
7%
6
1
1%
5
2
2%
4
0
No votes
3
0
No votes
2,1,0
2
2%
 
Total votes: 103

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boyjohn
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#31 Post by boyjohn »

nickname wrote:
boyjohn wrote: I think it would be boring if they kept trying to do what they did in the past. One of the reasons I love PSB so much is that they are always evolving and trying something new. The Way It Used To Be is one of the best songs they have ever done (IMO). I'm really glad they don't listen to you when they are making their music.
I'm not sure if you realize "Electric" is the album of the coming back to their original sound of the "Imperial Phase" mixed with the dance music of the present. "Bolshy" (it could have been a track from "Introspective", the latin and balearic acid house from the late 80's, "Domino Dancing" - part 2), "Love is a bourgeois construct" (anthemic, uplifting with a big male choir on it, "Go West" - part 2), The last to die (an electric dance version of a big rock star song, "Always on my mind"/"WTTHNN" - part 2), "Thursday" (a pop song with similirities with "Westend Girls", "What have I done to deserve this?", "Paninaro", "Domino Dancing") and even "Vocal" (an updated version of "It's alright"). :lol:

By the way, all these songs have been the ones more rated by the press and fans. Much more than the experimental tracks like "Fluoresecent", "Inside a dream" and "Shouting in the evening".

And I love PSB trying to go ahead I think to include "Example" raping on "Thursday" is amazing.
Thursday is really the only one that I feel "strongly" references the past. All of the rest only seem that way because it's Neil and Chris, they will always sound somewhat like things they have done before just because of who they are. You can't say that every time they use a choir on a song that they are redoing Go West, or that every time they do a cover song they are redoing Always On My Mind, those are insane things to say.
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Undertaker
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#32 Post by Undertaker »

10/10

The first album I've given that too since we had forums.

I've also been really impressed with how the promotion has gone, the controlled leak and the teasers. Neil and Chris have given us exactly what we wanted because they know exactly what we want.

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MD
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#33 Post by MD »

Undertaker wrote:10/10

The first album I've given that too since we had forums.

I've also been really impressed with how the promotion has gone, the controlled leak and the teasers. Neil and Chris have given us exactly what we wanted because they know exactly what we want.
The same with me, Electric is a perfect 10. It's up there with the best, easily in the top 5 albums of their career. They really are a highly under appreciated band. To produce something this great 3 decades into their career is a miracle. This just is not supposed to happen, bands almost never last this long and when they do the best of their work is almost always from the first few years.
We are very lucky to get this level of quality work at this late a date.
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Mark R.Y.
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#34 Post by Mark R.Y. »

nickname wrote:And I love PSB trying to go ahead I think to include "Example" raping on "Thursday" is amazing.
Yikes! And what does Example do during the other six days of the week? Bah-boom.

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BugBoy
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#35 Post by BugBoy »

9/10 for me, would have been a straight 10 except for the, IMO, weak Thursday. Just like AOTW from Yes, I really don't get why so many people want it a single. having said that, every other track on the album makes this a MAGNIFICENT release!
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Undertaker
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#36 Post by Undertaker »

BugBoy wrote:9/10 for me, would have been a straight 10 except for the, IMO, weak Thursday. Just like AOTW from Yes, I really don't get why so many people want it a single. having said that, every other track on the album makes this a MAGNIFICENT release!
Agree with Thursday. It's not a weak track for me but it's not a great track. It should be a single though because of the Example rap. That's the selling point. If he wasn't on it, it's an album track.

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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#37 Post by Nickname »

Undertaker wrote:
BugBoy wrote:9/10 for me, would have been a straight 10 except for the, IMO, weak Thursday. Just like AOTW from Yes, I really don't get why so many people want it a single. having said that, every other track on the album makes this a MAGNIFICENT release!
Agree with Thursday. It's not a weak track for me but it's not a great track. It should be a single though because of the Example rap. That's the selling point. If he wasn't on it, it's an album track.
Some people here suggest to delete Example's rap for a single release. :lol:

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Spittingcat
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#38 Post by Spittingcat »

Still a 10

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the8thark
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#39 Post by the8thark »

nickname wrote:You can add your own review.
I think I will. And thanks for your review. Well this will be more my random thoughts on the album and less of a "review".

This album is not one you should listen to in pieces first up. It's really an album that is best played all in one go. The tracks flow very well from one to the next. Yes and Elysium can be listened to piecemeal. Sure you can do that with Electric but you won't get the flow the PSB tried to create. The whole album is very upbeat. A good contrast from the more emotional Elysium.

This is shown in the track lengths:
3 - 4 minutes = 1 Track
4 - 5 minutes = 1 Track
5 - 6 minutes = 4 Tracks
6 - 7 Minutes = 3 Tracks

Axis: - Sounds a little different to the video version on youtube. The intro is longer and a little more produced. But apart from that's it's for the most part the same track. Nice beat, nice music. A great opener to the album. I thought the whole album would be like Axis, an album with few lyrics and great dance music. Sure the album is great, just the rest of the tracks have a lot more lyrics. Axis is not really representative of the album as a whole but it's still one of my favourite tracks on the album.
[edit] After re-listening to the album my assessment might be a little off. A some of the tracks here are quite on the vocal content. So maybe Axis in that respect is like the rest of the album.

Bolshy - A nice lighter track. To me it feels like just the song for a yippie dance party. Bolshy Bolshy Bolshy, how NT sings it really feels like one of those yuppie people looking down their nose in your general direction but trying to avoid looking directly at you. If you can imagine this with a great beat to back it up then you have Bolshy.

Love Is a Bourgeois Construct - My favourite track on the album at this point in time. This track reminds me a lot of Go West. Because of the other deeper backing vocals. These backing vocals don't sing anything apart from oohhhh and woah's. Unlike Go West where the other vocals actually sing words. As I listen to this I can hear two different parts in the music, the beat, and also the very lighter highlights. Well highlights is the wrong word, as if you removed the beats you'd have a very nice track. It'd sound not very PSB though but it'd possible. The deeper backing vocals really work well here. And it goes well with the theme of the song. To me this is the "I'm too old" song of the album. Most PSB albums have a track like this. Yes had King Of Rome and Elysium had Invisible.

Fluorescent - Musically a little dark. A lot of deep beats here. Not so many vocals here and the music to me is a little repetitive. I don't haver too much to say here, apart from the fact that it works as a whole album listen but on it's own not so well.

Inside a Dream - The track is bookended with some very nice synth sounds. But the meat of the track is very different. The bookends almost feel out of place to me. Almost not necessary. This to me is similar to Fluorescent. A nice beat but only great within the context of the whole album. But this track is a lot lighter in feel thankfully. Would work great on the dance floor I would think. Lastly the album notes say the hand claps in this song are done by Adam Blake. What? Are NT and CL's hand claps not good enough?

Last To Die - Another of my favourites on the album. But not my absolute favourite though. A great beat here. And the rest of the music here really fits well too. Very light in feel but also surprisingly emotional as well. I'm still trying to workout the exact meaning of the lyrics here. I realise it's a Bruce Springsteen cover. I'm not a fan of the boss so I'm listening to the boss's version of it now. Why did the PSB choose this track to cover? And what meaning did the PSB get out of this track? Anyway I can see the similarities in the two tracks, but I just feel the PSB version is way better. It's a little too emotional and sung way too fast by the boss to give justice to the deep lyrics. I think the PSB do much more justice to the lyrics here.

Shouting In The Evening - If you know the PSB song "Screaming" from Beside/Format (depending on whether you own the fan version or the official album, I own both). This song sounds a lot like that. Even the titles are similar. The main difference though is Screaming as a lot more lyrics. This track Shouting In The Evening has even less vocals then Axis. But the music is not as varied as Axis is. A lot of the same parts are repeated. Great in a club I'd say for the beat but as a standalone song, not so much.

Thursday - This brings me back to Yes. A track that feels just fun. Even the lyrics scream dance to me. Zero emotional content here, lyrically or musically. The chimes that come in every so often really lighten up the song to enhance that light, party, dance atmosphere the song tries to shove at you. If I was out and heard this, I'd defo get up and dance to it. The song would make me want to. It's just infectious.

Vocal - To me this is by far the weakest track on the album. To me it feels like NT is singing a song about himself singing a song. But said in the 3rd person. Just sing the song alright. I know you're singing it. I don't need to be told, "hey you're listening to NT sing". I know this. I have ears you know. The beat is nice I guess, but I think the vocal remixes take this to a whole new level and improve it 100%.

Conclusion
To me Electric feels more like a Disco then an album of originals by the PSB. Certainly an album that has to be listened to in one go to get the most out of it. Love Is a Bourgeois Construct, Axis and possibly Last To Die are ok as standalone tracks. Not my favourite PSB album at the moment. But that could change as I listen to the album more. I'd say it's my 4th favourite PSB album. But I don't really know every PSB album that well yet. I still have to buy them all. I own most of them though.

In order my favourite PSB albums are

1. Yes
2. Elysium/Very (I like them both equally 2nd best.)
4. Electric (there is no.3 cause of the tie above)

If I had to rate Electric out of 10 I'd give it a 7/10. It'd be great for a club. Great to dance to. But past that, even though the album is great, there's no instant love for me from the album. Needs time I think to grow on me. Elysium needed a lot of time to grow on me. Yes, the first PSB album I heard on the other hand I instantly fell in love with.
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BugBoy
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#40 Post by BugBoy »

Undertaker wrote:
BugBoy wrote:9/10 for me, would have been a straight 10 except for the, IMO, weak Thursday. Just like AOTW from Yes, I really don't get why so many people want it a single. having said that, every other track on the album makes this a MAGNIFICENT release!
Agree with Thursday. It's not a weak track for me but it's not a great track. It should be a single though because of the Example rap. That's the selling point. If he wasn't on it, it's an album track.
Agreed, weakest, not weak. Although to say that to release it as a single BECAUSE of the Example rap i think is a redundent argument, a bit of a sell-out. A song should be a single because it deserves to be a single in its own right, not because of an 'in fashion' guest artist, which in its current form I dont think it is. I've listened to the whole album a few times today and I think it would be improved if Example sang the entire song since, particularly when Neil's singing the verses, I lose interest in it. I'd also like to hear an instrumental version, I think that could work really well as well.
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the8thark
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#41 Post by the8thark »

As an addition to my above words I do think Electric is slightly over produced. Many of the intros and outros to songs in this album are not really needed. I am listening to Love is a bourgeois construct now and the intro it has, lasting for approx 27 seconds was totally not needed. The one from ISAD was very nice I liked it a lot but simply not needed. This really only factors in if you take each track on it's own merits. But as we know this album is best as a whole album listen and not picking out the individual tracks.
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Peter1984
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#42 Post by Peter1984 »

Axis 10
Bolshy 9
Love Is A Bourgeois Construct 9.5
Fluorescent 10
Inside A Dream 8
The Last To Die 8
Shouting In The Evening 5
Thursday 10
Vocal 3

Electric 9/10

1st Please 10/10
2nd Electric 9/10
3rd Introspective 9/10
4th Behaviour 9/10
5th Fundamental 8/10
6th Actually 8/10
7th Bilingual 8/10
8th Yes 8/10
9th Nightlife 7,5/10
10th Very 7/10
11th Release 6/10
12th Elysium 4/10

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Glenny4
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#43 Post by Glenny4 »

Love Is A Bourgeois Construct 10/10

Axis 8.5
Fluorescent 8.5

Bolshy 8.0
Vocal 8.0

The Last To Die 7.5
Thursday 7.5

Inside A Dream 7
Shouting In The Evening 7



Behaviour
Please
Actually
Bilingual
Very
Fundamental
Introspective
Release
Elysium
Electric
Yes
Nightlife

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luca857
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#44 Post by luca857 »

the8thark wrote:I am listening to Love is a bourgeois construct now and the intro it has, lasting for approx 27 seconds was totally not needed.
I find it the best part of the song. On the contrary, the part with Chris-flushing-the-toilet towards the end is just embarrassing. That should've been removed IMO, it ruins a song which otherwise is quite nice (but far from their best, again IMO).

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Spittingcat
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Re: Rating: "Electric"

#45 Post by Spittingcat »

It's really an album that is best played all in one go.
Agree with that totally. Can't agree with much else said though.
I am listening to Love is a bourgeois construct now and the intro it has, lasting for approx 27 seconds was totally not needed.
Probably the only part of that track that I love! They'd be nothing to excite me in this one without that fantastic Wendy Carlos amped up intro.

There's not a track on the album that's too long, each track is an evolving journey, not just a song.

Thursday would edit down well, but that's not to say that this long version isn't ace as it is.

I'd like Vocal to be longer... it ends too soon. 3 or 4 minutes of instrumental added to the end would finish the album.

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