Iconic.
Mark Savage:
Her third album, Froot, has been sitting on top of the iTunes pre-order chart for months, thanks to her tightly-knit and on-the-ball fanbase.
Those fans - the "diamonds" of her stage name - have already received six of the tracks, which were released in monthly instalments before the full album is revealed next week.
It's an innovative release strategy - and one that was partly necessary, after the singer realised her subtle, slow-burning new material wasn't likely to feature on daytime radio.
"I actually said to the label, I don't want to have to depend on radio support, so I focused completely on the fans."
Originally, the plan was to issue "two songs a month that were polar opposites sonically, like double A-sides," says Diamandis, "but iTunes wouldn't let me do that".
"It was probably for the best, because with this strategy you still get half an album that you haven't heard yet.
"And it's been really creatively liberating," she says. "I have no commercial pressures any more. So I'm able to survive in a really weird way."
The 6 songs are definitely slow-burners but so rewarding.
I didn't like the release 'strategy' at first but it's worked. 'Froot' is out on Monday and I'm very keen to hear the remaining songs.
I've been revisiting the first couple of albums a lot recently too. Electra Heart is flawed, but stands up to repeat plays.
I posted this video last November.
I'm posting it again.
WHAT AN ALBUM.
MG Siegler, on the new MacBook:
What’s funny is that I’m wondering if there won’t be an actual upside to this trade-off beyond the usual iterative path to progress. By introducing a machine with Intel’s slower Core M chipset, might Apple also be moving us closer to a world where their own mobile chipset, the A(X) line, can step in?
As a Mac developer, I find the prospect of new, non-Intel chipsets both scary and exciting.
Earlier on Twitter I linked to Kevin Rose's article on Techcrunch - The Gold Apple Watch Is Perfect For Douchebags, where he couldn't see the Gold $10,000+ Watch appealing to tech or watch enthusiasts and commented:
Benedict Evans makes several interesting points in his post:
So (and this is the question that actually matters) why bother? One could argue that it’s a vanity project, or that Apple’s doing this just because it can, or that a few hundred million dollars still matters at Apple (as indeed it does). But I think it’s more interesting to compare it with Apple retail. Despite its prominence, this is only about 10% of Apple’s revenue. It’s much more important as marketing. And it's great marketing.
btw, I'm not interested (at least for now) in buying any version of the Apple Watch but I'm oddly fascinated by the product and why it appeals to others.
Tom Hocknell:
Rebel Heart starts so bloody well it’s basically the EP of her career, although there’s an immediate sticking point. The problem with “Devil Pray” isn’t the sultry tune, which flirts with Arabic chanting in the same way “La Isla Bonita” flirted with flamenco, but the lyrics. If you pretend she’s 18 it’s great, but she wouldn’t be where she was today if she followed half the song’s suggestions: “We can get stoned/And we can sniff glue/And we can do E/And we can drop acid”. Really? Didn’t we get this ‘down with the kids’ thing out of the system with the MDNA album?
Without wanting to detract from her own songwriting, Madonna has recently worked with so many people that it’s almost insulting to those she hasn’t. There are too many lazily dialed in collaborations from people she’s never met, and there’s even a song called “Illuminati”, which perfectly demonstrates why b-sides need to be re-introduced (there are 19 songs here, when there could be 12).
Spot on review. It's such a haphazard album and far too long. I always like to listen to albums in full but with this one I'm going to make a supercut playlist and forget that half of it exists.
Still, miles better than her previous two albums.