You Are Free by Cat Power

Pros: Lovely voice, emotional lyrics, touching melodies...
Cons: Melodramatic, depressing, and monotonous...

You Are Free is a simple, yet incredibly complex album.

Immediately inviting, Chan Marshall’s (aka Cat Power) fifth full-length release of new material is a mature album of sparse rock tunes and melancholic piano-driven...

Pros: Some great, subdued rock and indie pop.
Cons: A few songs miss the mark.

The decision to check out the new Cat Power album You Are Free was an easy one. Not only had I heard a lot of buzz about it, but I was able to hear one of the tracks, He War, before the album was released in February 2003 on Matador Records...

Pros: A Striking, Harrowing Masterpiece from Cat Power.
Cons: None unless You're Not Into Depressing Music.

Though not the taste of many, melancholic music or “Sadcore” has always been enjoyable for those who love depressing music because of its fragile nature, dense textures, and introspective songwriting. From bands like American Music Club and Red House ...

Pros: Eloquent and touching
Cons: Depressing

You'll never hear any smooth studio arrangements from Chan Marshall, a.k.a. Cat Power. To her rough and unpolished music, she brings a formidable sense of the proper emotional buttons to press. Though she's not a conventionally good singer, she's got a...

Pros: Cat is back.
Cons: Either you like this sort of thing or you don't.

I don't know how many people have heard it, but there is a version of the Rolling Stones' "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" in which the chorus has been omitted entirely, and the rest of the song is played with so much passion and yet so much restraint...

Pros: Can be awfully depressing
Cons: Can be awfully depressing

This is the most depressing album I've ever heard in my life. Lots of musicians make music attempting to evoke depression, but usually all they can hope to get a handle on is the standard sadness/dragging quality that's been done to death since old black...