Is This the Life We Really Want Bad Review

avril 19, 2022 Enregistrer un commentaire

Information technology's difficult to know where to get-go when reviewing an album that represents the first new release from an artist in most 25 years. Not that Roger Waters has been inactive for the menstruum – far from it. In fact since his return to the live loonshit in 2000 he has been extremely agile for a long time, with a succession of tours covering mostly aspects of the Pinkish Floyd back catalogue, besides touching upon areas of his solo work and sometimes introducing new songs. That touring has mostly been with a like cast of musicians, culminating in the heed bravado "Roger Waters' The Wall" shows of the last four years. Towards the finish of that run of shows Roger implied that this was probably the cease of his touring on that scale and also had mentioned a new album project. Merely this isn't it. The "when will they stop killing the children?" concept hasn't appeared, although he says information technology hasn't gone abroad for proficient. Instead nosotros are presented with this anthology, of new material – none of the songs that Roger has featured alive over the last few years appear – with a new lineup of musicians, more often than not, and a new producer.

So what is information technology like? Has it been worth the wait? Well it depends what you wait and that's the thing that's been a dilemma for me on initial listening – what should I expect from an artist who hasn't had a major release for 25 years? It'south been obvious to those who follow Roger's career, and in particular the live shows he played in 2016, that the electric current world situation has exercised him significantly and in particular Americans' choice of president. This is not an album about Mr. Trump, although he does feature in both a lyrical references and speaks within the audible properties, just information technology's very much Roger'south reflection on how he sees the world today. Just when y'all call up you're in for a full album of political raging, Roger throws a curveball and the album ends in a way that I didn't wait.

"Is This The Life We Really Want?" Album Cover

In reviewing this anthology it would exist very easy for me to list out the songs and in particular, the parts from the Pink Floyd back catalogue that they pay homage to/ resemble. In that location is admittedly no doubt that Waters has fix out to contain some of those familiar sounds and textures from his work with Pink Floyd. I'm non certain what is his rationale for this, given that this is something new. It's clear that he is not striving to create a "pretty fair forgery" as he called David Gilmour's first Floyd effort following his departure. Mayhap information technology's the influence of collaborators Nigel Goodrich and Jonathan Wilson. Whatever the reason,echoes (no pun intended) of the 1970s Floyd experimentation, the stripped back sounds of the terminal cut, synth tones of the Dark Side/Wish You Were Here era, the echoing terminal word of the sentences from Animals ("rock… stone… etc) or the aural soundscapes of The Wall all feature here in different places I have to admit that for me this was initially a bulwark – it is prevented me from hearing the songs underneath and instead I was going "Oh that sounds similar…". I'm sure that was the function of the idea and a choice was fabricated to work on a familiar "tin every bit". It was a lark at to the lowest degree the kickoff but afterwards several listens it's merely part of the song. and that'southward non a bad thing.

This is very much an album of two halves. The first role feels similar information technology is Roger'due south treatise on the world today – and he's asking lots of questions. What is God doing? What are our politicians doing? What am I doing and could I practice it better than all of them? Roger concludes that he could "I've done a better task" but yet I'k not quite certain what he would have washed. Colourful language abounds, perhaps unnecessarily, but I assume this is his way of driving home the message. Information technology's probably non a surprise given his history to say that this is a really practiced album to listen to on headphones – at that place is so much going on from the opening heartbeats and detuned radios and TVs – at ane indicate I actually got upwards to open the door which I idea was existence knocked, merely it turned out it was just the sound effects.

Post-obit the short instrumental, we have the album opener – "Deja Vu" – it doesn't have the ability of the bombast of the kickoff tracks from some of Roger'due south albums, heed yous. I'thousand guessing that on this anthology Roger has not felt constrained to work with the normal poetry/chorus/ bridge /guitar solo/chorus etc, which a lot of Floyd's famous songs follow. So on this song, the last section feels like a divide chunk, not directly linked to what went earlier. I haven't noticed a guitar on this album – again perhaps that'southward a deliberate determination, possibly not. Maybe the unavoidable comparisons to his onetime right-hand man have promoted this – maybe the music just doesn't need it.

I've already referred to the soundscape and backgrounds that feature on the anthology. One thing I haven't mentioned and then far is the actual instrumentation. It's actually fairly stripped back – drums, bass, acoustic guitar, piano and 1970s sounding synths. At that place don't appear to be a huge amount of overdubs on this album – information technology'south quite an organic sound and it'south all the better for it. It definitely makes it stand out from a lot of his previous work. The vulnerability and, dare I say, limitations of Rogers voice joined with bones pianoforte or guitar actually enable his message to hit home. By the time we go to "Picture that", the scientific discipline is overwhelming and overpowering equally his anger rises and the music follows suit. It's quite a standout track on the album for a number of reasons – we are very much in "Animals" territory hither, only this time the raving (and possibly drooling?) are coming from Roger. But the acrimony is left hanging at the song's end and instead the side by side track – Broken Basic – is him attempting to reason how did we finish upwardly where we are? His decision is that, left in the backwash of the 2nd Globe War, we chose consumerism and greed as our way of life, and these what brought us to where nosotros are now. These are familiar themes he has explored before only are very much in a contemporary context. The album carries on touching on these areas, at times raging, at times trying to reconcile, at times information technology'south merely music and sound furnishings from past times.

And so it comes as a bit of a surprise that the ending is something very unlike – a 3 song suite which is simply almost love. It seems that he has vented his anger and Roger is focusing on what'southward important to him, and where he has found, peradventure, his peace and his resolution. Is this the message of the album? Greed is the problem, dearest is the answer? Not sure but it sounds similar a adept way to end.

I've already said this is non an anthology I loved direct away. Only it'south an album I kept coming dorsum to. I wanted to listen to it again – and not because I liked what I heard, but because it felt like information technology was worth exploring. It's non specially clear to me what Roger thinks the solution is to all the things he mentions before on. He doesn't come up with answers and the closest he gets is to say: this is what works for me.

Is this the anthology I really wanted? I'grand not sure, But it's definitely one that's worth listening to.

Released Past: Columbia Records
Release Date: June 2nd, 2017
Genre: Progressive Rock

Band members:

Roger Waters / vocals, acoustic guitar, bass guitar
Nigel Godrich/ keyboards, guitar, sound collages, arrangements
Gus Seyffert/ guitar, keyboards, bass guitar
Jonathan Wilson / guitar, keyboards
Roger Joseph Manning, Jr./ keyboards
Lee Pardini / keyboards
Joey Waronker / drums
Jessica Wolfe/ vocals
Holly Laessig / vocals
David Campbell / string arrangements