Chapter 11 in
The Call To Write helped me get an idea of what my review needs to contain. My topic is about an album, so the review that helped me the most was the one by Sashe Frere-Jones about Beyonce's album "I am...Sasha Fierce." I really enjoyed how the author expresses positive feelings towards Beyonce as a human being, yet gives her album a negative review. The contrast between the positive elements of Beyonce's career and personality, versus the negative and unbalanced structure of her album created an interesting read. I specifically like the author's analysis of the song, "Single Ladies." '"Single Ladies' is an infectious, crackling song and would be without fault if it weren't the bearer of such dull advice." Yet, even though she does not like the album as much as she had hoped, the author still says that Beyonce is "really good at being good."
For my paper, I am reviewing the album
Quadrophenia by The Who. At first, I was just writing about the album from my own perspective. But about half way through my paper, I found an article that reviews the album in a very similar way that I am. The link is here:
http://www.billboard.com/articles/review/5763116/the-who-s-quadrophenia-at-40-classic-track-by-track-review. I was delighted to find that my review contains many of the same ideas as the professional review above. It also gave me insight as to what certain songs are about and how my analysis of these songs were sometimes way off the mark. The author of the article and I have the same thoughts on the song "Quadrophenia". We both believe that the song acts as a stumbling point for the album, but that it is still musically excellent.
I really think that contrasting in a review is necessary. It helps keep the review interesting. If the reviewer only chose to talk about the positives or only talk about the negatives the reader would lose focus. Having a one sided review would make readers think the reviewer was biased and therefore untrustworthy. I like how the reviewer on Billboard.com reviewed every song separately. That can be useful to readers who want to see how each song was and not just a review of the whole album together.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your thoughts on the Beyoncé review. It was great in giving historical evidence of her along with some reviews on her songs. The review you gave explained in good detail the significance of album with historical evidence. I also like how the review gave us clips and recordings of each of the songs within the album. It gives us an insight of who these musicians were.
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