In which Jer might be off a bit about our site demo…
[Video][Website]
[5.57]
Jer Fairall: Gather ’round, kids, and let me tell you about a thing called the 1990s. Some short time after Nirvana, but a few years before pop was safe to become Britney Spears again, bands like Mazzy Star actually managed a few fluke moments of popularity. I don’t mean they were popular like you heard them on Grey’s Anatomy or set them as your profile song on MySpace (for you younger kids out there, I’ll tell you about 2005 next time), but that they had actual, on the radio hits, sorta like you’d hear Adele today. What’d they sound like? Well, the hipper, more Pitchfork-reading among you may have heard people like Feist, Stars and Beach House by now, so imagine Mazzy Star as a sort of tempered mixture of all of those, denser than one (and nowhere near as jazzy), less extroverted than the other, and yet not quite as comatose as the last. By all means, go YouTube “Fade Into You” and find out for yourselves. It’s good. This is a little bit closer to what you kids tend to call a FAIL.
[5]
Anthony Easton: I never really listened to Mazzy Star, and I think this is the first time that I have sat down and had a real opinion about them. But I am intrigued. This is strung-out and beautiful, the perfect kind of spooky for a Halloween that recognizes the spirits are more melancholic and autumnal, and less random things that go bump in the night.
[8]
Sally O’Rourke: “Common Burn” feels less like a proper song than a teaser trailer for the new Mazzy Star album: bits of evocative, moody imagery meant to pique curiosity and assure fans of the fidelity to the source material, but missing the compelling story that lets it stand on its own.
[5]
Brad Shoup: I was really hoping the title was a reference to the playa, but since it’s really about the inherent attraction of harmonica to overcoats, I can’t be bothered.
[4]
Katherine St Asaph: More an album interlude than a single, but that’s fine. All Mazzy Star needed for a successful comeback is here: a working delivery system for David’s woozy guitar and Hope singing things like “your overcoat and your beauty.”
[7]
Alfred Soto: Brian Eno’s “Julie With…” is an unexpected model, I must say. I liked Hope Sandoval better when she garnished a Chemical Brothers song though.
[5]
Pete Baran: Even less “there” than most Mazzy Star tracks, it’s not so much a triumphant return as a will-this-do stab at recreating atmosphere. It’s a perfect falling asleep on the train song, but I don’t like falling asleep on the train. I end up in Bedford.
[5]