I try to live in black and white, but I'm so blue

Continuing my trip forward in time through the album charts

24/05/24 : Hit Me Hard And Soft - Billie Eilish

Our third visit with Ms Eilish and my impression so far has been "what am I missing?" - I liked her Barbie single but I'll be surprised if this convinces me of her genius.

Hmmm - it's all very pleasant and there are some interesting enough noises on it which are all well constructed, but there's not enough variety across the album to convince me of genius.  "L'Amour De Ma Vie" and "Blue" did stand out for me - the rest of it is all perfectly fine but, on first listen at least, not particularly noteworthy.  At this point, though, I do have to bring in my guest reviewer of the week - Isobel (14) who is much more of the target market for this kind of thing and she assures me that I am (as is often the case) completely wrong.  And, under normal circumstances, that would be that - but...

...I'm making more of an effort these days to check out other new entries in the chart and at #7 this week we've got Beth Gibbons's Lives Outgrown (which is a great title) who I've always quite liked from both her Portishead days and her later solo efforts.  And I liked this one as well - and whilst listening to it I was struck how it wasn't a million miles away from Billie's effort and was left wondering why I enjoyed one and was left a bit cold by the other.  So I gave Billie a relisten and I have to concede I got more into it so it feels like it could be a bit of a grower - I'm not saying it's going to get further chances, but you never know!

We're at a completely unsurprising #1 with a new entry in the chart this week - I suspect she'll be hanging around for a bit.  The rest of the top five are Taylor Swift, Zayn (another new entry which I listened to and it was considerably more interesting that I was expecting), The Weeknd and Olivia Rodrigo - it's a good top five for the young ladies this week.  There are three more new entries in the top ten this week - Beth Gibbons (#7 as previously discussed), Slash (#8 - I'm sure you'll like this if you like it, but it's probably not going to be my sort of thing) and Michael Head/Red Elastic Band (#10 - I was intrigued as to how this is so high, so checked it out and I've still got no idea).  I also checked out Bright Light Bright Light (#60) because of the cool name and the album cover which is giving off somewhat gay vibes so I wasn't at all surprised to hear it's an early Pet Shop Boys sound (and quite well done if you like that sort of thing).

Last week I said that Kings Of Leon would drop to #13 and I will be the first to admit that I was way off because they're at #50 - I'm quite surprised I was quite so wrong, not least because it was a pretty decent album.  Next week, I feel Billie and Taylor are going to be the top two and it's probably a coin toss as to which one's on top, but I'm going to go for Billie.  And this week's Taylor stats are one in the top ten, three in the top thirty and nine in the entire chart - with three still just hanging in there in the nineties.

Wikipedia has less on the album than I expected but obviously I took the opportunity to remind myself that her real name is Billie Eilish Pirate Baird O'Connell.  Somewhat bizarrely Wikipedia tells us that the album was well received with "critics praising it for its songwriting, experimental production, and concise runtime".  Concise runtime?  That sounds like the sort of thing I'd say!  It's done OK commercially as well, getting to #1 everywhere Wikipedia lists except for Italy (#2) and Japan (#12).

"Customers also listened to" Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan (who's been hanging around the middle of the album chart for a couple of months now), Sia and Dominic Fike (who I've never heard of).  I'm glad I gave this album a rare second chance (and Billie should definitely thank Beth for that) - it's definitely well put together and feels like it could be a proper grower.

17/05/24 - I liked this more than expected
31/05/24 - More enjoyable than I expecting