Patrick Watson - Wooden Arms reviews
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A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y
| Pitchfork |
 Back in 2007, the easy literary comparison for me to make with Patrick Watson's out-of-nowhere Polaris-pinching Close to Paradise was Peter Pan. Like the ship in a jar that decorates the album cover, Paradise was a fantastical world in miniature, intricately detailed and designed to evoke imaginative flights of fancy. It was also too ethereal: all flying and no destination. A year and a half later, Watson is back with his third album, Wooden Arms, and not much has changed. He's still waiting to sweep us from our bedroom windows and show us a wonderful world that exists in the realm of the fantastic, his voice is still cartoonishly woozy and antique-sounding (part Jeff Buckley, but also M. Ward and Devendra Banhart), and his music still sounds like an ultra-busy score for a highbrow children's book or a whimsical silent film. And the same vexing problem keeps arising: When the band isn't making music that operates under a frustrating dream logic, they're, well, lulling me to sleep.
Wooden even features a song called "Where the Wild Things Are", which should surprise no one. Watson, still inextricable from the liminal state between dreaming and waking life, wrote the piece as an homage to his favorite book as a child, with the knowledge that Spike Jonze was adapting the book for an upcoming film. The song's light, apprehensive piano and foreboding pizzicato strings do have the feel of a score (Watson actually sent it to Jonze on a lark). Too bad it's meant to stand on its own on Wooden, because it doesn't do much without a proper cinematic referent. Watson's simplistic, light-headed incantations-- "I go to where the wild things are"-- aren't exactly transfixing, and the arrangement as a whole bogs down in pre-bedtime sleepiness on its way to dreamland....full text |
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| Herohill |
Two years ago, like most of the world, I was relatively new to Patrick Watson. I really enjoyed Close to Paradise, but was shocked that he got a Juno nod and was absolutely floored when he grabbed the coveted Polaris Prize over names like Feist, The Besnard Lakes, Plaskett and Arcade Fire. Now, two years later Patrick Watson is a name on everyone’s tongue and his upcoming Secret City release - Wooden Arms - is one of the most anticipated of ’09 in the Canadian scene.
One listen to Wooden Arms and it's obvious that the last two years have been kind to Watson and his band. They’ve traveled the world, taking influence and inspiration from the exotic locales they visited and talented musicians with which they’ve played. It’s so easy to throw out easy qualifiers for this record – more mature, Canadian Radiohead (his falsetto begs the Yorke comparison at times) – but they make light of the success of Wooden Arms and the consistent collection of songs Watson delivers. More importantly, they take away from the way Watson blends influences and his own originality. Atmospheric and orchestral tones are constant, as is the clanking percussion the band is fond of, but the subtleties show the band using a much broader palette....full text |
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| Spin |
| When he keens about going "Where the Wild Things Are," Patrick Watson need only look close by -- he's already three feet off the ground in his own strange, beautiful world. The Canadian singer-songwriter's third album of baroque pop is a meandering path of Puckish enthusiasm and Jeff Buckley warmth, moonlit and effusive with churning pianos, tense strings, and crisp xylophone. More ambitious than on past efforts, Watson slips through quiet night spaces, and like Sendak's Max, puts on his wolf suit, making mischief of one kind, then another, until Wooden Arms flares with his vibrant energy....full text |
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