I look myself in the face and whisper "I'm in the wrong place"

Continuing my trip back through the 2010 album charts.

28/02/10 : The Family Jewels - Marina & The Diamonds

Yay!  I'm so pleased I've gotten to see this album - I never imagined that would happen.  The eagle-eyed amongst you might argue that I've already written about it - but I don't care, I'm writing about it again (and the format was somewhat sketchy back then, to say the least!).  

I love this album and listen to it reasonably frequently - I saw her playing these tracks at Glasto wearing some VERY fetching orange dungarees.  It does have a high degree of quirk ("We are the spoons, metal-ly mean - we scooped our way into your dreams.  To knock the knives out bloody cold and lead you down the unforsaken road") but it's a quirk I like - she's got a great voice (although not as trained as later Marina) and the songs generally have a good hook to them.  "Hollywood" is the one everyone knows - I think "I Am Not A Robot" and "Are You Satisfied?" are my favourites, but I won't hear a bad word about any of them.  

We're at #5 with a new entry this week at the start of a 29 week run - I had no idea it had done quite so well (easily her longest lasting album, although Electra Heart, the follow up, got to #1).  The rest of the top five were Gaga, Glee, Alicia and Florence - another strong week for the ladies!  And we have two more new entries in the top ten - Courteeners (#6) and Johnny Cash (#9).

Wikipedia has a lot more than I was expecting on the album (202 milliPeppers) and I read it because I'm a fan, but I'd struggle to say it was actually interesting - unlike her entry, which has all sorts of mad things in it (aged 18, she moved to London to study music despite having no musical background - which resulted in her enrolling and dropping out of four courses).  The album had mixed critical reviews - they generally liked the songs, but weren't so sure about her vocal delivery.  Commercial performance was also mixed - she was obviously expecting to do better in the US than she did (#148) which might explain the musical swerve she performed on Electra Heart (which didn't work out over here, but did go down well in the US).

"Customers also listened to" Sohodolls, Mitski, The Dresden Dolls and Tikkle Me - a load of people I can tell you very little about (I've only even heard of two of them).   But, for me, there's only one Marina - I've seen her live several times and she always puts on a good show and it's nice to see her sounding happier and more grounded than she did in these early days.

21/02/10 - Nope, I don't need this
07/03/10 - Not a bad album at all

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