rate This Was 2021 | WINNER!

[creativity.]

Is my little love the only 30 song left?

[Saddy]

8 minutes ago, supaspaz said:

ALL NIGHT PARKING

with Erroll Garner

 

Average score: 7.30

High score: 10 (@supaspaz, @Quicksand, @Reverie)

Low score: 4 (@Saddy, @MP2K)

 

 

What makes an interlude? Is it simply a shorter run time? Does it represent a musical sketch rather than a complete artistic concept? Must it abandon traditional song structure? Adele, not known for her concision, has never played with the format before, and on 30, her inaugural experiment is still longer than several tracks from Sour and Jubilee. But, oh, is it glorious! At nearly three minutes, this Amy Winehouse-esque, neo-soul mood piece envelops the listener like a warm bath, as Adele moons over her first relationship since leaving her husband. “All Night Parking” is built on Joey Pecoraro’s 2017 instrumental “Finding Parking,” which itself samples jazz pianist Erroll Garner’s “No More Shadows,” leading Garner to posthumously receive the first-ever feature on an Adele album. Its steady rock never wavers or climaxes and the track ultimately conclude without shifting out of first gear, much like the doomed long-distance relationship it commemorates, a perfect meeting of theme and form.

 

Best bit: “I get lost in our hours 'cause you possess powers I can't fight”

 

ATRL says...: “The interlude being one of the best songs… kii,” @Ewan Chaos laughed. @BnPac was proud of Adele. “When I clicked play on 25 a few years, I really didn't think that she had it in her to do a song like this. She can actually be good.”

It looks like I have no taste cuz this song scored 7.30  

[Reverie]

Just now, supaspaz said:

They are really coming for your faves today!

Oh look a Supa and Rev 10 finally

 

#ThankYouLofiGirl 

 

[supaspaz]

2 minutes ago, creativity. said:

Is my little love the only 30 song left?

Indeed! 30, sweetie, I'm so sorry.

[supaspaz]

3 minutes ago, Saddy said:

It looks like I have no taste cuz this song scored 7.30  

Well, you said it, not me.

[supaspaz]

LITTLE Q, PT. 2

 

Average score: 7.42

High score: 10 (@Ewan Chaos)

Low score: 5 (@creativity.)

 

 

A cautionary tale from the perspective of Little Simz’s cousin, “Little Q, Pt. 2” is about the inherent challenge of navigating life as a Black boy from the ‘hood of South London. With his father gone and no role models to look to, Quddus turned to the streets – and then, after surviving a nearly fatal stabbing, turned his life around. In case you were worried that Sometimes I Might Be Introvert was veering into respectability politics, the outro, with its chorus of children that recalls both praise music and a nursery rhyme, reminds us that the “real criminals live in the suit.”

 

Best bit: “Lived bein' angry my whole life like it's part of my DNA/I couldn't tell you why it became something that we embraced/Then we take that same anger and turn it into someone else's pain”

 

ATRL says...: "Always my favorite from the album,” @Ewan Chaos wrote, adding that he thinks it “it’s kinda underrated.”

[McNulty]

The fact that All Night Parking outlasted OMG, To Be Loved and Love Is a Game is laughable 

[Reverie]

All Night Parking mightve been the first non Easy On Me song I heard from the album randomly so it gave me higher hopes for the album ngl

[supaspaz]

3 minutes ago, Reverie said:

Oh look a Supa and Rev 10 finally

 

#ThankYouLofiGirl 

They said it wouldn't last, we had to prove them wrong!

[Wyvern]

"All Night Parking" is the best thing Adele has put out.

[supaspaz]

Never going to understand the 30 hate. I still think it's her best album.

[Reverie]

1 minute ago, supaspaz said:

Never going to understand the 30 hate. I still think it's her best album.

I don't hate it, just certainly don't love it either. It had enough nice songs for me (for an Adele album LMAO)

[supaspaz]

And now Japanese Breakfast's turn!

[supaspaz]

KOKOMO, IN

 

Average score: 7.45

High score: 10 (@Taemira, @Norte)

Low score: 1 (@Born to Run)

 

 

Michelle Zauner’s favorite song on Jubilee is this wistful goodbye to a teenage love. Sung from the point of view of a boy in “Kokomo, IN,” the track is his farewell to his high school sweetheart as she leaves their hometown. With wisdom that belies his age, he graciously recognizes that she is destined for greater things than their relationship can offer, but hopes they can reunite someday. The title nods to another Kokomo: the paradisical island invented by the Beach Boys, whose classic “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” was an inspiration for the dreamily plaintive vibe that Japanese Breakfast captures here.

 

Best bit: “Watching you show off to the world the parts I fell so hard for”

 

ATRL says...: “Never been there!” @madonnas shared. Me neither!

[supaspaz]

2 minutes ago, Reverie said:

(for an Adele album LMAO)

[MP2K]

On 7/26/2022 at 9:10 PM, supaspaz said:

THEREFORE I AM

 

Average score: 6.93

High score: 10 (@Norte)

Low score: 1 (@Ewan Chaos, @creativity.)

 

 

A rare fun moment on Happier Than Ever, its swaggering second single – which was actually released half a year before the album was even announced – is a biting dismissal of an unwanted hanger-on. In the René Descartes-quoting chorus, Billie Eilish reasserts control over her narrative, taking it back from those who have tried to write it for her. “Therefore I Am” quickly became one of her biggest hits, leaping to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in its second week, while ultimately topping pop radio and reaching #2 in rock and alternative airplay. Its playful music video, shot on an iPhone in two lengthy unbroken sequences, finds Billie causing havoc overnight in the Glendale Galleria mall before she is chased out by a security guard. 

 

Best bit: “Top of the world, but your world isn't real/Your world's an ideal”

 

ATRL says...: “Always hated this,” @Ewan Chaos seethed. “Maybe because it takes me back to the 5 minutes a week I’d be in my car going to the grocery store in late 2020/early 2021 and this was all they played.” @creativity. shared that he “was driving my sister’s old car that doesn’t have aux capabilities when this song was big, meaning I had to listen to the radio, meaning this song got shoved all the way down my throat to my stomach. I despise it.” I sense a theme!

Her only bop, her only song..I cared for before coming this

On 7/26/2022 at 9:24 PM, supaspaz said:

OH MY GOD

 

Average score: 6.95

High score: 10 (@creativity.)

Low score: 1 (@BnPac)

 

 

What are those fluttering, squiggly noises that initiate this frisky second single from 30? For a brief moment, they portend one of the most magnificently curious songs in Adele’s oeuvre – before it settles into a more conventional Greg Kurstin production about stepping back into the dating pool after divorce and the anxiety of trying to find love again. After “Oh My God” debuted at #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 the week of the album’s release, it quickly replaced “I Drink Wine” as the next single, ultimately becoming a solid pop and adult contemporary radio hit and reaching the top ten in 20 other countries. The black-and-white music video, helmed by “Rolling In the Deep” director Sam Brown,” features a cadre of dancers, references to past Adele clips and, of course, the queen of sitting in chairs sitting in a lot of chairs.

 

Best bit: “What is the likelihood of jumping/Out of my life and into your arms?”

 

ATRL says...: “They should have just made it an EDM song like it obviously sounds like it was intended to be,” @madonnas proposed. @Ewan Chaos called it “the Rebecca Ferguson-ification of Adele.” @BnPac could not understand how it was chosen as a single instead of “Can I Get It.” “It's bad, just bad,” she ranted. “It's not even guilty pleasure-level bad that is good. The pre-chorus doesn't work, the chorus is not punchy and the verses are weak. What's there to like?”

The lashings

 

On 7/26/2022 at 9:31 PM, supaspaz said:

GIRL LIKE ME

ft. H.E.R.

 

Average score: 6.99

High score: 10 (@ultraviolence.xx)

Low score: 1 (@Born to Run)

 

 

As Heaux Tales draws to a close, Jazmine Sullivan has been broken to the core by trifling men and the games of modern romance. On this morose acoustic guitar ballad, produced by Bongo ByTheWay, she and H.E.R. contemplate how to compete with the gold diggers and strippers wearing Fashion Nova dresses, whose sensuous charms have stolen away their boyfriends. The bridge briefly sets their rage free, as they wonder why their loyalty and affection was not enough, but they ultimately accept that the only way to beat ‘em is to join ‘em. The ho transformation is complete. Released as the album’s third single, “Girl Like Me” spent a single week on the Billboard Hot 100 at #97, but reached the top ten on R&B radio.

 

Best bit: “And I ain't wanna be/But you gon' make a ho out of me”

 

ATRL says...: @Ace Reject felt that the features bring the album down, “especially H.E.R. doing her sleepwalking bit as per usual.”

H.E.R. is sickening.

[Reverie]

Never been there! [3]

[Taemira]

not the best song on jubilee leaving this early 

[supaspaz]

2 minutes ago, MP2K said:

H.E.R. is sickening.

In a good way or a bad way?

[supaspaz]

4 minutes ago, Reverie said:

Never been there! [3]

I'm shocked!

[supaspaz]

POINT AND KILL

ft. Obongjayar

 

Average score: 7.45

High score: 10 (@supaspaz, @madonnas, @creativity.)

Low score: 5 (@Ewan Chaos)

 

 

With its danceable Afrobeat and brash confidence, it’s a wonder this Sometimes I Might Be Introvert standout, released as the album’s fifth single with a Bonnie and Clyde-esque music video filmed in Lagos, hasn’t been snapped up already for the soundtrack of an international action film. The chorus, sung by Nigerian musician Obongjayar, is based on a phrase that derives from the process of picking fresh fish at a market or restaurant: the customer points and the seller kills and prepares their selection right then and there. The whole world is similarly Little Simz’s for the taking.

 

Best bit: “Point and kill/If I want it, it’s mine” is so much fun to sing

 

ATRL says...: “Excluding the interlude, this 1-2-3 punch is just too powerful,” @madonnas said, referring to the run of tracks that begins with “Rollin Stone” and “Protect My Energy.” @BnPac was less impressed. Though “it has a promising start,” she felt “it loses direction and punch quickly.”

[Reverie]

3 minutes ago, supaspaz said:

In a good way or a bad way?

I had the same question 

[supaspaz]

3 minutes ago, Taemira said:

not the best song on jubilee leaving this early 

It left already at #46

[supaspaz]

1 minute ago, Reverie said:

I had the same question 

He gave "Girl Like Me" a 9, so his artpop really could mean anything.

[McNulty]

2 minutes ago, supaspaz said:

POINT AND KILL

ft. Obongjayar

 

Average score: 7.45

High score: 10 (@supaspaz, @madonnas, @creativity.)

Low score: 5 (@Ewan Chaos)

 

 

With its danceable Afrobeat and brash confidence, it’s a wonder this Sometimes I Might Be Introvert standout, released as the album’s fifth single with a Bonnie and Clyde-esque music video filmed in Lagos, hasn’t been snapped up already for the soundtrack of a jet-setting action film. The chorus, sung by Nigerian musician Obongjayar, is based on a phrase that derives from the process of picking fresh fish at a market or restaurant: the customer points and the seller kills and prepares their selection right then and there. The whole world is similarly Little Simz’s for the taking.

 

Best bit: “Point and kill/If I want it, it’s mine” is so much fun to sing

 

ATRL says...: “Excluding the interlude, this 1-2-3 punch is just too powerful,” @madonnas said, referring to the run of tracks that begins with “Rollin Stone” and “Protect My Energy.” @BnPac was less impressed. Though “it has a promising start,” she felt “it loses direction and punch quickly.”

Deserved Top20. Such a good song with an amazing production