The Idler Wheel...

Fiona Apple - The Idler Wheel...
Critic Score
Based on 33 reviews
2012 Ratings: #4 / 1118
Year End Rank: #5
User Score
2012 Rank: #6All Time: #236
Liked by 517 people
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CRITIC REVIEWS

100
Entertainment Weekly

You have to give yourself over to The Idler Wheel in a way you probably haven’t done since you were a kid, before jobs and other adult responsibilities claimed the long hours you spent curled up by your stereo speakers. It isn’t easy listening. But it’s worth it.

100
AllMusic
Stripped of all her carnivalesque accouterments, Fiona Apple remains as rich and compelling as she ever was, perhaps even more so.
100
Pretty Much Amazing

After sixteen years, Apple has finally reached her megaton moment. The Idler Wheel is her ferocious eruption.

100
A.V. Club

The Idler Wheel… is an innately private record, as Apple’s tend to be, but she has a way of drawing listeners in as she pushes them away, luring them, siren-like, into the maelstrom of her own reflection.

90
Pitchfork

The Idler Wheel's spareness does lend it an insular loneliness, one that's divorced from the outside world while also being intimately in-tune with its basic realities.

90
Billboard
On her fourth album and first full-length in seven years, she presents a stunning portrait of her interpersonal relationships that's more even-keeled than any of her past works.
90
The Line of Best Fit
Her use of the piano as a physical instrument is unparalleled in popular music, owing more in terms of influence to Lazar Berman or Daniel Barenboim than any of her direct contemporaries.
90
Sputnikmusic

The Idler Wheel is an emotional thesis that cannot be ignored. It is perhaps the most unforgettable work of her career.

90
Under the Radar

The Idler Wheel is Apple’s biggest statement yet, its textured, booming soundcapes finally living up to the conflict housed in her twisted poetry. It’s a tension that leaves the album swinging from the uncomfortable to the divine.

90
Consequence of Sound

The Idler Wheel succeeds in creating a singular world more daring than any of Apple’s previous records and one of the most daring pop records in recent history.

90
No Ripcord

The sparse, even unprompted production only makes it richer, resulting in a fascinating unanimity of piano and voice that turns more involving with every clink, clatter, and clap.

90
The Needle Drop

On her first album in seven years, singer-songwriter Fiona refines her usual style into something simpler, but emotionally potent.

90
musicOMH

Apple has quite cleverly developed musically in just the right way, creating something utterly distinct and different to her earlier work whilst still retaining all the characteristics that won fans over to begin with.

87
Coke Machine Glow

The Idler Wheel ... is Apple’s best work yet, spontaneous and so utterly unique, uninhibited and self-possessed in its sonics and language, risky and jarring, full of sharp turns yet encountering beauty everywhere, it feels like the first document to fully explore the depths of her talent.

85
Prefix

She’s refining her outlook here, and The Idler Wheel… stands as her most concentrated and mature record yet.

85
Spectrum Culture

The Idler Wheel… is Apple’s most stripped down, musically simplistic album, but it’s no less heartfelt or harrowing for that.

84
Paste

Few vocalists can erase the distance between performer and listener as shrewdly as Apple can, and that toggle gives The Idler Wheel its strange power.

83
Beats Per Minute

Since there’s so little to grab onto, The Idler Wheel might be better understood as an emotional statement rather than a musical one.

80
The Telegraph
The results are impressive and dazzling, if occasionally baffling.
80
NOW Magazine

Thankfully, Apple’s return to music is not only undeniably powerful, but Idler is arguably her best work yet. It’s strange, raw and grabs your attention the way few modern albums can.

80
Mojo
It's a hyper-vivid and intensely musical affair that takes us deep inside Apple's skittish, fretful mind.
80
The Arts Desk

Not that Apple, on this work or any other, has ever been one to shy away from the messier parts of human emotion. Her wordplay may be complex, but the metaphors she employs are stunningly effective.

80
Uncut
It's Apple's refinement as a writer that makes this harrowing psychodrama so gripping.
80
The Guardian
It's an album that demands something of the listener, but rewards it in spades.
80
Slant Magazine

The Idler Wheel captures what’s made Apple one of the defining artists of her generation: a persona that’s reflected changing views of private versus public spheres.

80
American Songwriter
The degree of difficulty she is attempting is extremely high, yet the results are often startlingly good.
80
FACT Magazine

The Idler Wheel… is her most adult work yet, a record that’s underpinned by the fundamental grown-up characteristic of embracing one’s own ridiculous, stubborn dysfunction because, Hell, what other option is there?

80
SPIN
The unexpected triumph lies not in the spectacle of the singer raw-dogging her emotions, but in her total command of the anarchy that results. The demons remain, but her talent prevails.
80
NME

The tension created by the lyrics and music is wonderful and uneasy, ensuring that ‘The Idler…’ is endlessly fascinating and unlike anything else you’re likely to hear this year. 

80
Tiny Mix Tapes

The Idler Wheel’s ramshackle, barely-holding-it-together aesthetic can’t be anything but carefully constructed, but in an artistic sense, that’s a virtue, not a vice.

70
Rolling Stone

Sometimes the songs drag ... But Apple's kooky energy pushes through the slow spots.

60
PopMatters

Whipping Cords seems to require far too many listens to really reach that ‘viola!’ moment—sure to result in exhausted listeners who try desperately to love the record as much as they think they should

BradTasteMusic
91

I listened 5 times in a row to prepare for the new album, and that definitely helped since this is way out of my lane of interest

Albums like this are VERY rewarding for being patient, and open minded. This album is a gentle, but powerful listen. It’s hard to really explain because I’m not used to loving this kind of shit so much

barcooper
93

"How can I ask anyone to love me, When all I do is beg to be left alone?"

The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do is a long ass name, but also a good ass album by the legendary singer-songwriter Fiona Apple, one of my favorite singer-songwriters of all time actually. This is one of my favorite albums from Fiona, let's understand why.

After seven years of no new music, Fiona finally released her long ... read more

RemisReviews
49

TRIGGER WARNING: There might've been a slight usage of the P-word in this review, please proceed with caution.

I've heard Fiona's name get thrown around soo much, but I never actually listened to any of her stuff. So it was about time, I decided to start off with this album, because why not? It's the highest-rated one, and while I don't trust average scores, I was hoping for it to be good... so was it?

In my honest humble opinion, no... Not really. Was it bad? Not necessarily, but I wouldn't ... read more

MarinerBeaches
100

In the instance of her being butter, he's a hot knife i guess????

90

my least fav

whenthehissing
93

can't she be perfect for a minute?

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Track List

1Every Single Night
3:29
95
2Daredevil
3:28
92
3Valentine
3:32
93
4Jonathan
5:03
90
5Left Alone
4:50
93
6Werewolf
3:12
93
7Periphery
4:58
89
8Regret
5:16
90
9Anything We Want
4:40
91
10Hot Knife
4:02
94
Total Length: 42 minutes
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Added on: April 2, 2012