The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You
Sign In to rate and review
CRITIC REVIEWS
90
The Worse Things Get is a no-brainer Album of the Year.
10y
90
On The Worse Things Get, there’s not a weak song.
10y
90
It's some of her most instantly gratifying work as well, perfectly encapsulating all of her personas, from the erudite, whiskey-shooting provocateur to the sweet and soulful, small town crooner who sounds like she was plucked from the pages of a novel set in the antebellum north.
10y
90
On this, her latest and most emotionally charged album, she's managed to create a painful outpouring of honesty, one that strikes that coveted balance of both melodic and lyrical expression; her message is equally powerful from each direction.
10y
90
On The Worse Things Get…, Case asserts herself less in a literal sense, but paints the most emboldening and endearing portrait of herself yet
85
The Worse Things Get may not be a definitive album for Case like the country noir of Blacklisted or an artistic breakthrough like Fox Confessor Brings the Flood. It’s not even a comeback album, as Middle Cyclone was a success in any reasonable sense of the term. But it’s Case at her tightest as a songwriter and a singer, without any weaknesses or leaden tracks on the whole album.
82
Somehow, The Worse Things Get is Case’s tightest record and also her strangest. With its off-kilter arrangements and eccentric turns of phrase, it’s a world unto itself.
10y
82
The Worse Things Get is a listen that tears and breaks, an album defiant and loud as often as it is anxious and sad.
10y
80
Her latest album is a little more conventional but no less arresting.
Print Only
1y
80
Case has mostly abandoned the elegant mythologies that have previously so typified her songwriting.
80
The closing Ragtime offers a happy ending of sorts, but this is too honest a record about unhappiness and grief to deliver a neat, redemptive conclusion.
80
Vitality courses through every song on her sixth album.
80
A new depth to her prickly but previously sometimes brattish lyrics, a grown up album by a real grown up who knows how to sugar-coat a pill for mass consumption.
80
Sometimes her directness is harrowing: Where Did I Leave That Fire? opens with sonar bleeps and a cold ripple of piano, and finds Case all but dissociated from herself: "I wanted so badly not to be me." If this makes the album sound self-indulgent, rest assured it is far from it.
80
Exposing her honest and disarmed self more than ever, Neko proceeds to open old wounds.
80
It's a tribute to Case's ever-growing strength as a songwriter that she refuses to take the sharp edges off the vicissitudes her songs depict while still acknowledging the humor and occasional beauty of those edges.
80
Her perfectly turned sixth LP deals with identity and autonomy; it's got feminist musculature and the dirt of a working musician under its fingernails.
80
For Case, this is likely a cathartic effort; it’s improbable this path will be revisited, unless more tragedy befalls her, but it’s a tremendous listen and a wonderful demonstration of her talents nonetheless.
10y
80
While Harder doesn't suggest giving up this fight to be heard, it encourages the listener to think about the fight in a different way—by accepting shortcomings, recognizing the narrowness of socially-constructed paths, and starting to rise above it all.
10y
80
It’s a record that often elevates the listener through its integrity and intensity, and sometimes grates through its failure to find the right music to express its complex lyrical sentiments.
10y
80
Her voice is a bear hug in the literal sense; succumbing to it is like being carjacked by Patsy Cline.
10y
80
Proving herself to still be one of the most authoritative voices in the alt.country firmament, Neko Case’s sixth album is typically sumptuous and lusciously heart-rending.
10y
80
One advantage of Case being “peaceful and strange” and generally unique is that she can release an album like this and most listeners won’t bat an eye. Only about half of The Worse Things Get really sounds like anything she’s done before under her own name.
10y
75
Wwhile the subsequent inconsistency may hold The Worse Things Get back from greatness, it does make it honest, and when it comes to art I’ll take honesty over consistency any day.
10y
70
These experiments help keep the record sounding fresh, but the best moments come when Case stays within her wheelhouse and swings away.
70
It’s wholly solipsistic. By nature, the listener is alienated, as we tend to care most about the songs we can relate to. But The Worse Things Get isn’t about us or even for us. These 40 minutes belong to Neko Case. It’s her cleansing.
10y
60
Not an easy listen, but a satisfying one.
50
She’s settled into the safety of contemporary indie-folk, giving The Worse Things Get… the same kind of innocuous sound as radio-friendly groups like The Civil Wars and Of Monsters And Men.
10y
10 years ago, when I seriously entered in the world of deeper music, I listened plenty of artists and one of them is Neko Case. I may be a little biased by my musical roots but the worse thing is more than just a biasis.
Neko Case has a pretty long longevity since she debuted more than 20 years ago. With each of releases, she pushes more and more her songwriting and her sound. But it's with this album that I think she fully opens herself up with her songwriting and her sonority.
This album ... read more
This was my personal AOTY for 2013, which may have been partly influenced by it being my first true exposure to Neko Case, and THAT voice. There's this timbre to Case's singing that's so commanding but sweet. The way she attacks the notes is striking, and some songs here wouldn't have left much of an impression in the hands of a less-capable singer.
But holy hell this thing is hook-y, even as many songs forego traditional verse-chorus structures. "I'm From Nowhere" cycles through ... read more
this album feels a bit punchier than her previous work with more edge to it, while managing to preserve the kind of profundity and beauty neko so often captures. some of my favourite lines of hers are on this album
this album feels a bit punchier than her previous work with more edge to it, while managing to preserve the kind of profundity and beauty neko so often captures. some of my favourite lines of hers are on this album
Anyone who has listened to Neko Case knows that she can belt and wail as powerfully as any other singer — but she’s never full-on rocked as hard as on her excellent 2013 comeback album “The Worse Things Get …”. Here, Case’s twangy past is essentially a different memory; while her songs are still bolstered by lush alt-country instrumental flourishes, “The Worse Things Get …” feels like Case’s indie rock album, and she goes as hard as ... read more
Purchasing The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You from Amazon helps support Album of the Year. Or consider a donation?
Become a Donor
Donor badge, no ads + more benefits.
Donor badge, no ads + more benefits.
Advertisement
Track List
| 1 | Wild Creatures 2:39 | 85 |
| 2 | Night Still Comes 3:47 | 87 |
| 3 | Man 3:28 | 90 |
| 4 | I'm from Nowhere 3:01 | 70 |
| 5 | Bracing for Sunday 2:17 | 72 |
| 6 | Nearly Midnight, Honolulu 2:34 | 70 |
| 7 | Calling Cards 2:36 | 87 |
| 8 | City Swans 4:04 | 87 |
| 9 | Afraid 2:20 | 80 |
| 10 | Local Girl 2:34 | 83 |
| 11 | Where Did I Leave That Fire 3:27 | 62 |
| 12 | Ragtime 5:14 | 92 |
Total Length: 38 minutes
Year End Lists
| #2 | / | MAGNET |
| #2 | / | PopMatters |
| #3 | / | Variety |
| #5 | / | TIME |
| #8 | / | A.V. Club |
| #10 | / | Listen Before You Buy |
| #12 | / | Slant |
| #15 | / | Amazon |
| #16 | / | eMusic |
| #20 | / | Cokemachineglow |
More Lists
Comments
Please stay on topic. To go off topic, head to the General Chat.
Sign in to comment
No one has said anything yet.
Added on: June 11, 2013