Till the Sun Turns Black : Ray LaMontagne
Written: Sep 24 '06 (Updated Jan 26 '07)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: It is something new from someone I love.
Cons: It falls way short of expectations.
The Bottom Line: This is not an album I want to listen to again. I recommend getting Ray's first album, Trouble and skipping this one.
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| christian921's Full Review: Till The Sun Turns Black - Ray LaMontagne |
I first heard of Ray LaMontagne last year and quickly fell enamored with both his rich vocals and the rawness of his music. Ray sings with an impassioned voice that is all to rare in the racks of canned pop and recycled rock that fills store shelves and jams on our radios. Ray sings like no one is listening. With that he brings himself forward to you without fear, pure and convicted. There are no hidden messages with his music as it sounds like he singing it only you. That is what I like about him; that unmasked quality.
Within the last month LaMontagne has released his second full length album, Till the Sun Turns Black. Ray’s first album was Trouble in 2004 which sold just over 250,000 copies. He has spent his time touring and found the time to release an official “bootleg” of one of his shows, the Live from Bonnaroo 2005 disk. His fans, small but committed were anxious to finally get a listen of Till the Sun Turns Black.
Ray does very little to hide his musical influences in his own songwriting. As a pure singer/songwriter he reaches well beyond those substantial confines. There are many that have mentioned some pretty big names in regards to Ray’s styling. With Till the Sun Turns Black you can still find those foreign voices that creep around in Ray’s head coming out in his music. At times these influences are not so subtle. As the track Can I Stay sounds too much like a post Beatle Lennon to be mistaken. Aside from the sound alike tracks there are also times when this album abruptly changes pace from one genre to another. Track to track Till the Sun Turns Black will flip you from soulful soul music to 70’s blues to Lennon-like ballads and back again. Another departure from his established sound Ray abandons the simpler sounds found on Trouble and dresses his music up some. The only recognizable LaMontagne track is Lesson Learned.
Till the Sun Turns Black is still soulful, exposed and emotional is its delivery. At times the music is both vivid and stark. The tracks engage you. Ray sings passionately and the songwriting is not so deeply personal to leave you lost in translation. To give you what his music sounds like is difficult as each track sounds so much different than the next. Ray does have a smooth tenor voice with a powerful breath but for his musical muse, that can be a tough one to figure out on this album. As a folk singer Ray sings great soul music.
Personal Impressions
For me though the album misses on a few points which is a very tough thing to admit to. I want to love this album but I simply can not. Track to track this album is all over the spectrum in style, delivery, emotion, flow and sounds more like compilation than a complete album. This makes it nearly impossible to listen to this album straight through. Too many of the tracks sound like someone else’s work. Be it Ray paying homage to favorites or just trying to improve on an already established sound, either way it just doesn’t work for me. This album has way too many misses for me and not enough that I want to listen to again and again. Lesson Learned is the only real highlight on this album.
As a fan of Ray’s I hate to say this but I would recommend skipping this album. Trouble is an outstanding work but this one withered in the brilliance of the first. I truly hope that Ray follows up with another album soon. He does have a wonderfully rich voice, a voice that should continue to sing.
Tracks
Be Here Now
Empty
Barfly
Three More Days
Can I Stay
You can bring me flowers
Gone away from me
Lesson Learned
Truly, Madly Deeply
Till the Sun Turns Black
Within You
11 songs, Play time is 48.2 minutes on iTunes/iPod, 44.9 MB
My review of Ray LaMontagne's first album Trouble.
Thank you for listening,
© Christain 2006
Recommended:
No
Great Music to Play While: Going to Sleep
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Epinions.com ID:
christian921
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Member: Christian Stanley
Location: A country mile north of Omaha, NE USA
Reviews written: 117
Trusted by: 35 members
About Me:
I loved you even before I met you.
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