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HomeMusicPopSinger-SongwritersExtraordinary Machine |
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|  | | | Customer Reviews: | | | Average Customer Review:
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0 of 1 found the following review helpful:
 Not her best, but still great. Nov 24, 2008
I don't know what happened during the record of this, but there's something missing. The thing is that after 'When the Pawn...', that was a masterpiece, I was expecting a great follow up.
The album lacks the power of her previous ones. Maybe Jon Brion's absence as the producer, I don't know. The highlights are the more direct songs like 'Window', 'Please Please Please' and 'Get Him Back'.
I hope she teams up with Brion again for a return to the glorious times!
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
Extraordinary Talent, Heavy on Dissonance Oct 24, 2008
Fiona Apple writes uniquely and uses her phrasing skill to squeeze even more artistic juice from her work. This combination alone singles her out as a rare talent. She seems to be at her best when least encumbered by the addition of musical gimmicks like looping of instruments or clapping that appear on several tracks. The use of two different producers is evident in that the first song, Extraordinary Machine, and the last song, Waltz (Better Than Fine)were produced by Jon Brion using a straight-forward, ensemble instrumentation approach. These two songs showcase Apple's artistic skill without getting in her way. The rest of the CD is not as successful in this endeavor, but the production of Mike Elizando and Brian Kehew is not without merit. In this collection of songs, Apple expresses her many frustrations and observations about relationships. The music is often dissonant and choppy to match her emotions. It is here that the producers brought a strong attitude to the music and attempted to give weight to Apple's dissonance with a little hip hop production technique.
Given the subject matter and Fiona Apple's approach to it, this CD is not easy listening by any stretch of the imagination. It is, however, an emotionally effective expression by a gifted artist.
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
I certainly haven't been shopping for any new shoes. Jul 25, 2008
Fiona returns, and she is on fire. A quite impressive album, though it falls a hair short of achieving the brilliance of 'When The Pawn...' I prefer this over 'Tidal' which in itself is pretty spectacular as well.
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
 A Little Stick of Dynamite Jun 16, 2008
Such a small woman with such a big voice. She is amazing. I listened to this CD today,2008.
2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
Flawed Masterpiece May 09, 2008
Like all Fionas albums, Extraordinary Machine has fantastic, creative lyrics backed up with a wonderful voice and perfect instrumentation.
So where does it fall short? - the mastering, sadly someone made the decision to have the album mastered by "Big Bass" Brian Gardner who is famous in the industry for making 'hot' or overly loud recordings.
Perhaps having the volume turned up to 11 works for hip hop albums, but it does Fiona no favours here. Having the volume level almost constant all the way through just makes it tiring to listen to.
There are leaked MP3's floating around the net which contain early studio recordings of Extraordinary Machine, although clearly unfinished the leaked tracks sound better simply because you can hear the full dynamic range of the music.
While it's far from being the worst victim of the 'loudness war' it could have been so much more.
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