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Review of Bjork's 'Post'

© Nick Bendel

Bjork is a unique musician who impresses the listener with her depth of feeling and love of music. "There's a sense of identity I can hear very strongly in [my] music," she once said, and it's quickly apparent. Sometimes she screams at the top of her lungs and sometimes she whispers for effect, but the one constant is that she is anything but a half-hearted performer. Added to this is her curious singing voice and the unusual way she approaches many of her songs.

So Bjork is definitely one of a kind. The result is that she tends to polarise people. She is one of those singers you either really love or really don't. On the positive side she has one of the most loyal and passionate group of supporters, all of who are enchanted by her remarkable style. On the negative side, however, many of her songs can come across as being dreary and repetitive and ultimately, despite a few pleasant detours, that is what Post (1995) seems to offer. Many of the tracks appear so similar that it is hard to tell where one starts and another ends.

The first half of the album is certainly the best. The opening track "Army of Me," despite being quite enjoyable, in many ways sets the tone for the rest of Post with its unavoidable trip-hop sound and insistent beat. Next comes "Hyper-ballad" which is wonderfully intense in the Bjork style - "emotions weren't created to just lie around. You should experience things to the full."

From there the album seems to go downhill. Still there are some good ideas here and there, such as the imaginative horn section on "I Miss You" - but just not enough. "It's Oh So Quiet" is typical of this. Bjork is passionate and shows just how good a singer she is on this wonderful show tune. The catch, though, is that she didn't write it.

It's very hard to make an absolute judgement on this album because it is one that people will react to in vastly different ways. Either way Bjork makes the listener work very hard with her heartfelt lyrics and animated style. For some people, though, that is just not enough.

RATING: 4/10