The Colour in Anything

James Blake - The Colour in Anything
Critic Score
Based on 34 reviews
2016 Ratings: #121 / 1004
Year End Rank: #25
User Score
2016 Rank: #267
Liked by 75 people
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CRITIC REVIEWS

100
Albumism
Not that we need any further reminding, but Blake’s latest achievement reinforces just how unique and vital of a creative force he is. Album of the year, until otherwise notified.
91
Entertainment Weekly
If this is what modern soul music sounds like in 2016, consider James Blake the genre’s sharpest visionary.
91
Consequence of Sound

Now that a broken heart’s left him wounded, the melancholic fissure of his music widens, dropping him into a pool deeper than any he’s ever found himself swimming in before. Yet here he is, splitting it up, sectioning it off, and presenting a work that feels equal parts natural and divine.

90
Drowned in Sound

As with Overgrown, Blake has expanded far beyond the sonic roots he forested on his self-titled album.

90
musicOMH

A staggeringly impressive and confident third album from an artist who has reached the very peak of his powers.

90
FasterLouder

The Colour in Anything is a work of restless invention, standing as Blake’s most creative collection to date.

90
Exclaim!

From its weighty subject matter to its incredibly nuanced production, The Colour in Anything is not only Blake at his best, but also his most personal.

90
No Ripcord

His voice is peerless, quietly adapted to his world of minimalist beats and ghostly electronics. The effect is stark, and intensely compelling. At 17 tracks long, this is a listen that plumbs substantial depths, but in Blake’s world, time ceases to be a constraint.

85
The Young Folks
This album is not perfect in the slightest, but it is so well put together.
85
The 405

It's an introspective, at times hesitant collection yet in the way most introverts allow themselves to relax within company, the more time you invest in The Colour In Anything the more readily you will discover its qualities.

83
Pretty Much Amazing

Even if Colour doesn’t drastically alter Blake’s sound, it widens and refines it, keeping what made his first two records so memorable while hinting that there remains ever further room for growth.

82
Pitchfork

In the best way possible, in no way shape or form is The Colour in Anything a rapid departure or reversal of what Blake does well. He still paints in deep blues and greys. His production is still unparalleled, spacious, and impossibly textured. His voice is still chilly and metallic, but maintains all its choir boy charm. His music is still towering and menacingly sad.

80
Under the Radar

In an era of 9-12 track albums, The Colour in Anything comes in at 17 songs and the amount invites you to explore and absorb at random, offering moods and tempos beyond just the ruminative and forlorn.

80
DIY

A record that reveals itself slower than his previous works, unfolding like a flower rather than bludgeoning you with balladry.

80
The Line of Best Fit

Blake is stood on his own as the darkening sky burdens him on the album's artwork ... It perfectly encapsulates the sound of The Colour in Anything, and of James Blake’s allure in general - taking an intense and isolating gloom and turning it into something beautiful and distinctive.

80
NME
'The Colour In Anything' features Blake's richest and most emotionally resonant work yet.
80
The Arts Desk
Blake is not doing anything that will persuade detractors, but he is building stunning and ambitious structures on the foundations of his previous work.
80
The Guardian

This album of digital anxiety and millennial unease is wrapped in something that feels both toweringly accomplished and heart-wrenchingly frail – and for that reason it should be treasured. 

80
Record Collector

TCIA is full of the kind of love and loss that can heal the deepest of wounds.

80
Tiny Mix Tapes

The Colour In Anything emphasizes the element of trust that collaboration implies and its role in articulating Blake’s feelings. It’s an act that stresses both our desire to share and our yearning to create, even when we aren’t really sure what it is we want to say.

80
Mojo
A challenging listen. But such is Blake's sonic invention and flair for extricating beauty from the murk, it's well worth sticking with.
80
The Observer

More soulful, perhaps, than its predecessors, but overlong at 17 tracks, it expands Blake’s bleak vision.

74
Resident Advisor

The promise and brilliance of The Colour In Anything's best songs are replaced by a sense of listlessness. In his mission to keep things quiet and subdued, Blake nearly snuffs out his own flickering flame.

70
Rolling Stone
Blake's third album (all 76 minutes of it) reaches back to the abstract electronics and agile, brittle beats of his early EPs while pushing his songwriting towards new levels of sad urgent grandeur.
70
The Sydney Morning Herald
The album is too long at 17 tracks – the similarity in tone becomes wearing – but in concentrated bursts, Blake makes the best art-music-meets-soul fare out there.
70
God Is in the TV
It demands that you sit down and really listen to the record in all its glorious misery but it’s also dusted with the kind of magic you could only find on a James Blake record.
70
Uncut

The Colour In Anything is Blake's fullest and boldest work yet.

70
SPIN

Like the watercolor cover art depicts, there’s even a glint of light and new tonal colors to be found in Blake’s monochromatic sound.

70
AllMusic

Compared to the self-titled debut and Overgrown, this a more graceful and denser purging, one that can soundtrack some intense wallowing or, at a low volume, throb and murmur unobtrusively in the background.

60
NOW Magazine

The Colour In Anything is a good album that could have been great if Blake had been a bit more willing to edit and discard his less successful sonic experiments.

60
Slant Magazine

The Colour in Anything, as dazzling as it often is, finds Blake sidetracked by all the things he can do and doing them coldly, rather than focusing on the few things he should.

60
Q Magazine

These songs are Blake at his best and most sonically inventive. At 75 minutes-plus and 17 tracks, though, the whole presents a challenge at odds with the sensitivity of those romantic reveries.

50
The Needle Drop
Singer-songwriter and producer James Blake returns three years after this sophomore effort, delivering a surprisingly lengthy and disjointed album.
50
PopMatters

The rest is, as mentioned, colorless and tedious, with Blake’s typical lugubriousness added in.

CJay
60

Quality over quantity is the most important thing for an album. I would rather have a short album that has amazing tracks than a long album that has boring or even terrible tracks. Sadly though, The Colour in Anything seems to go for quantity over quality.

Now, this album isn't bad in any way. However, this album is WAY too long for the sound it's going for, with most of the tracks feeling like filler. Most of the tracks on this album aren't that interesting and are kind of generic, which is ... read more

AndreVital
100

The wonderfully evocative cover for this album is a fitting image for this absolutely stunning album.

Sometimes things don't get easier.

Recently I've been making a new habit in my first week of my new boarding school. Every night, I'll sit up on my windowsill, open my window and stare at the stars. All of this whilst listening to this very album.

The last month I've been thinking about what makes music special to me. What does music need to do to me for it to be more than just good or ... read more

Quet
87

It's creative, experimental, winding, and sad; not much more to ask for.

70

Too much fat on this one, theres a good album in there somewhere which is annoying and keeps me coming back.

82

Big JB once again finds a way to find incredibly emotive music… in parts. This albums biggest flaw is by far its consistency, which can detract from the listening experience, however when it clicks it is some of Blake’s best work up to this point with space being utilised similarly to the debut whilst also transferring the more synthetic electronic elements of overgrown and his first few EP’s. All in all a very good album however it is not above criticism with some of the ... read more

AnotherWhiteMan
80

White man approved.

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Added on: May 5, 2016