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Secular Hymns
2016 studio album by Madeleine Peyroux From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Secular Hymns is a 2014 studio album by American vocal jazz singer Madeleine Peyroux. It has received positive reviews by critics.
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Editors at AnyDecentMusic? rated this album a 7.2 out of 10, aggregating six scores.[1] According to the review aggregator Metacritic, Secular Hymns received "generally favorable reviews" based on a weighted average score of 79 out of 100 from six critic scores.[2]
Editors at AllMusic rated this album 4 out of 5 stars, with critic Matt Collar writing that this album "finds the vocalist/guitarist delivering a stripped-down, largely acoustic set of warm, eclectic cover tunes... that's a 180-degree turn from her previous effort, 2013's ambitious homage to Ray Charles, The Blue Room.[3] At The Arts Desk, Mark Kidel rated this album 3 out of 5 stars and characterized Peyroux as a "sultry cabaret chanteuse with shades of late-night jazz and the endemic melancholy of the blues" but complains that "this is blues lite, too clean for comfort".[4] DownBeat's J. Poet gave 5 out of 5 stars to Secular Hymns and praised the ensemble on this recording: "Herington’s guitar adds blue, sliding, sustained notes that echo the crying tone of a steel guitar to support Peyroux’s somber vocal".[5] John Fordham of The Guardian praised the combination of "intimate exuberance and classic songs" captured in the live-in-studio setting and rated this release 4 of 5 stars.[6]
In The Irish Times Cormac Larkin rated Secular Hymns 3 out of 5 stars, ending "they’re the sort of songs that can sound hollow and insincere in the wrong hands, but Peyroux delivers every word like her life depends on it".[7] Christopher Loudon of JazzTimes called the blending of blues music, Gospel music, and jazz "a marvelous mélange".[8] The Observer's Dave Gelly scored this release 4 of 5 stars for "the warm intimacy of her voice and the incisive clarity of the arrangements".[9] Writing for PopMatters, Steve Horowitz a 7 out of 10, summing up that "Peyroux offers fine performances, but they are hers and not the originals" and these songs are "mostly well-known classics from the past—they aren’t records meant to be broken but to be replayed again for their own merits".[10]
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Track listing
- "Got You on My Mind" (Howard Biggs and Joe "Cornbread" Thomas) – 4:30
- "Tango Till They’re Sore" (Thomas Alan Waits) – 3:24
- "The Highway Kind" (Townes Van Zandt) – 2:47
- "Everything I Do Gonh Be Funky (From Now On)" (Allen Toussaint) – 3:16
- "If the Sea Was Whiskey" (Leonard Caston and Willie Dixon) – 3:07
- "Hard Times Come Again No More" (Stephen Foster) – 4:17
- "Hello Babe" (Lil Green and Kansas Joe McCoy) – 3:11
- "More Time" (Linton Kwesi Johnson) – 3:23
- "Shout Sister Shout" (Bill Doggett, Lucky Millinder, and Sister Rosetta Tharpe) – 2:42
- "Trampin’" (traditional) – 3:01
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Personnel
- Madeleine Peyroux – acoustic guitar, vocals, arrangement on "Trampin'", production, liner notes
Additional musicians
- Jon Herington – electric guitar, vocals, arrangement on "Hard Times Come Again No More"
- Barak Mori – upright bass, vocals
Technical personnel
- Cynthia Herbst – session coordination
- Daniel Herst – session assistance
- Doug Dawson – audio engineering
- Farida Bachir – session coordination
- Francesca Burton – session assistance
- Fred Gillham – session coordination
- Joe Jones – assistant engineering
- Mary Maurer – design at 2310 Design
- Michael Lau Robles – design at 2310 Design
- Shervin Lainez – photography
- Staurt Bruce – audio engineering, mixing, audio mastering at Bruce Audio, Bradford On Avon, England, United Kingdom
- Yves Beauvais – sequencing
Charts
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See also
References
External links
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