Björk - Homogenic POLL

"alarm call" is basically just björk tossing off a michael jackson pastiche though, which isn't necessarily a bad thing but its funk-lite bassline and hip-hop beats are really out of place on an album which is otherwise about ~epic strings~ and *crunching industrial beats* - plus i think she sort of makes a mess out of a perfectly good song by trying to make it too off-kilter and björky rather than a straight-up pastiche - everything in it sits together rather oddly.

i've never heard any of its remixes though! i should.

also, i def remember reading somewhere that it was to be originally titled "jacko" - no idea if this is true though

lex otm

i don't think being out of place is necessarily a bad thing, tho

tho the more i think about Alarm Call now, the less i want to listen to it, i do think it got a lot of people's attention who wouldn't normally have listened to bjork (i can attest to this based on a few friends)

her phrasing on "joga," it's like she's discovering language. amazing song.

don't they say she recorded this in the mountains?

like actually in the fields

Thought it was a mic cord all the way out to the ocean, but that might've been Post.

I'm kind of baffled by people out-and-out dismissing "Alarm Call".

I like Alarm Call but it doesn't quite fit here, it feels like a throwback to the first couple of hours.

I love the opening seconds of both Hunter and Joga but there's nothing here that quite measures up to the swept-off-your-feet-fucking-hell-we're-FLYING feeling of Batchelorette.

Since you mention it, I think I'm also in the minority that loves the ambient album version of "Love" waaaaaaay more than any of the remixes.

Nope, I'm with you. This was my vote, I love all these songs but "Love" just towers above her entire catalog.

Tough call between Joga, Bachelorette and All is Full of Love, but I went for the third one. It's as close to a song capturing a pure emotion as I can think of - spectacular. Strangely I didn't like it that much until I heard the video version of "Love", which helped me understand the structure.

i forgot how much i like 5 years!!

That song sort of describes the exact way I handle relationships.

I mean it describres it backwards... mhmm it's like Bjork is singing it to me... in my mind '5 years' and 'Hounds of Love' by Kate Bush are call and response songs. I sing out 'hounds of love' and then Bjork comes out calling me a coward, telling me I can't handle love... which is pretty much true.

xxp
yeah, surm, 5 years has grown on me a lot over the years.

it's very listenable, and touching without being too much

5 Years was my first favorite on this album, but then it moved to Alarm Call and I'm never looking back.

I Love 'Unravel', it's simple and beautiful and great songwriting and a fantastic vocal again. It's a tune I'd really like to cover, were I a musician.

the lyrics are also perfect on that one

The vocals in this album are her most forceful and beautiful, imo. As someone else pointed out, her phrasing here is consistently strange and lovely.

Very hard to choose, but "Unravel" for me too, mostly for personal, sentimental reasons: the best song for a long-distance relationship ever?

The lyrics to "Unravel" seem, to me, a loose adaptation of Breaking the Waves.

The lyrics to "Pluto" seem, to me, an example of prophecy inveighing against the hypocrisy of our times.

lol

All complaints directed against "Alarm Call" are coming from crusty but benign managing editors at defunct alt zines.

and lady cops.

We're up to our ears in this thread.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Pulling the trigger and voting "All is Full of Love." Because it will likely need more love.

Immature got my vote.

I voted for Joga but this album is pretty close to perfect. I think I only had to remove one track when I recompiled for the portable digital music player™

One time on this board max said if Obama was going to declare a "state of emergency," he should sing it like the Bjork song, and ever since then "Joga" has been a very amusing song to me.

Alarm Call, duh.

I can't remember if I voted for Unravel or Pluto :P

lol Stevie D @ your nickname and how it totally sounds as if she's saying that

I think "Joga" is one of the most beautiful sounding pop songs I've ever heard, so that.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

The right one of the two titans won, imo.

All Is Full Of Love 6

^ should have more imo.

I never heard "Unravel" until this evening. I'm somewhat lost right now.

Did anyone see this cover of Joga in episode five of Top of the Lake? First time I'd heard it and it floored me but perhaps it requires that context. To avoid spoilers I haven't linked to the scene, just the song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnEGSr5hRk4

I've rediscovered Bjork lately and 'Hunter' I think is my favourite. Such a weird song and single choice. Something that's cool about Bjork: the way her melodies and timing seem to slip around the music. She rarely stays on-grid, it's always very expressive and interpretive of the music. I think that was a barrier to me when I was younger, now it's something I appreciate a lot. I think Thom Yorke does this a lot in post-Kid A Radiohead, especially on KoL.

Would have voted for 'Bachelorette'.

the way her melodies and timing seem to slip around the music.

Latter days Beth Gibbons is very good as this as well.

Is it that time of year again where I listen to this album non-stop? This is a great album for spring time, you can almost hear the cold fading away.

Jóga is the obvious winner but I kinda wish Unravel had placed 2nd and Bachelorette 3rd. It predates the sound she would be following on Vespertine.

This is an album without a weak link, but it bums me out a little that the songs I'd call my top three were in the bottom four here.

The album version (which is actually the howie b remix) of all is full of love is inferior to the original version I have no idea why they decided to choose that one.

I strongly disagree, but that's a battle I've been losing for 16.5 years now.

the Plaid version is the best one.