Angel Olsen - My Woman


Angel Olsen
My Woman
2016
Spotify

This new album My Woman by Angel Olsen is getting wildly heralded as one of the best albums of her career and perhaps one of the best albums from this year. When you listen you understand why. This record has all the hallmarks that critics love, It's kinda folky, kinda rocky, doesn't sound new or modern and has a powerful female lead breaking down barriers. Here is the thing, all of those are absolutely true and My Woman is a stellar album, but the greatest album of the year this is not. For most of the record Olsen follows the same singer songwritter path that many have blazed before taking from element of folk, rock and country to get a rich sound but one we have heard many times before. "Heart Shaped Face" has this great spirit lying beneath it, and emotes throughout the track, but You cannot shake the sense that you have heard this before. This does two things: One, it gives you this warm comfortable feeling with her music and Two, it allows Olsen to get into well worn grooves and rhythms and just stick with them. Much of My Woman is pretty gender neutral, a real deliberate choice for Olsen, but it makes the album feel somewhat generic as if it could be for anyone anytime even though the lyrics are saying something very different.

Certain moments however feel so good and so right that you cannot help but find yourself somewhat falling for the record. The end of "Sisters" sticks out as one of the more magical moments on the record and it also happens to be a time where she shows the least restraint. "Those Were the Days" features a bass line that is so smooth sounding that you instantly sink right in. There are so many elements that go so very right on the album but as a whole I cannot shake the idea that it's all just a bit boring. She has this sadness in her voice but rather than empathize you find yourself wishing she would just move on. There is also this effect put on her voice to make it sound like it's from the 60s on the entire record which is just so lame sounding. I often don't find myself coming this at odds with the general consensus, but I simply can not go along with the pack on this record. Perhaps time will prove my wrong, but for now My Woman is not the one you are looking for.

6.9 out of 10

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