Reception
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic | |
| The Independent | |
| L.A. Times | |
| The Sun | |
| Tiny Mix Tapes | |
The album has received overall positive reviews. Simon Cosyns of The Sun wrote that "there are no boundaries to Byrne's work" and called the album "strangely compelling." Other reviewers have found the album too esoteric, such as Chris Barrett, writing for the Metro Pulse, who concludes his review writing "Recommended. But, as mentioned, probably not for everybody." Thom Jurek of Allmusic gave the album three out of five stars, calling it "pleasant for a while, but lightweight" noting that buyers would have to be "Byrne enthusiast... to find this set of compositions engaging in its own right, or addicted to very specifically themed cinematically inspired music, to truly appreciate what's on offer here." Some reviewers have noted the emotional sweep of the music, with John Constine of Tiny Mix Tapes calling it "a wide breadth of emotions... at times pensive and ominous, at others curious and wistful." In addition, the spiritual themes have been compared to Sufjan Stevens by several commentators as well as Byrne's other 2008 album, the Brian Eno collaboration Everything That Happens Will Happen Today.
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Famous quotes containing the word reception:
“To the United States the Third World often takes the form of a black woman who has been made pregnant in a moment of passion and who shows up one day in the reception room on the forty-ninth floor threatening to make a scene. The lawyers pay the woman off; sometimes uniformed guards accompany her to the elevators.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)
“Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own; which is the chief reason for that kind of reception it meets in the world, and that so very few are offended with it.”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)
“I gave a speech in Omaha. After the speech I went to a reception elsewhere in town. A sweet old lady came up to me, put her gloved hand in mine, and said, “I hear you spoke here tonight.” “Oh, it was nothing,” I replied modestly. “Yes,” the little old lady nodded, “that’s what I heard.””
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)