when you ask for most people's definitions of an "impressive album", the answer you'd likely get is an album that has an impressive display of performative skill or something that sounds epic and grandiose with many layers of instruments and while both of those are valid answers, the most impressive albums to me are ones that are as stripped back and unproduced as possible, relying entirely on the writing and composition of the music inside and this album is possibly the ... read more
it's interesting to note that "the fire this time" was almost a visual documentary and was only adapted into audio form due to channel 4 and the bbc rejecting it saying they "don't accept rant pieces", but in all honesty i don't think this would have the same potency it stayed true to it's original form. i think the experience is made a lot more personal and a lot more real by leaving the listener with no visual stimuli and having them piece together some ... read more