Will Butler of Arcade Fire has reviewed Grimes' new Art Angels album on Talkhouse, the website where artists talk about other artists. Despite asserting early-on that "Grimes is coming, to a large extent, from the world of 2000s pop, but she creates a giant, esoteric, viable world teeming with all sorts of poisonous Jurassic life," the Canadian multi-instrumentalist and composer overcomes his general disdain for 2000s pop (and Jurassic-era life on Earth) for just long enough to compare Grimes to Eiffel 64 and discuss the cultural importance of Bob Dylan and Prince among other pop music and literary icons.
As Pitchfork notes, Butler doesn't exactly delve directly into the review and seems unsure of how to even approach the album: "I appreciate and admire Art Angels. That sounds lame - no, it's like how Orthodox Jews and devout Mormons get along. 'I respect your devotion, and you probably understand me better than, say, anyone else on this F train - but I really, really don't care that much about your Jesus. High fives on father Abraham, though.'"
As Stereogum points out, the review doesn't stray far from the critic's initial point that he detests digital pop music, but somehow seems to like Art Angels. In fact, his opinion of the actual work he is reviewing via comparisons to other works of art remains pretty vague until the end when he draws comparisons to T.S. Eliot's classic poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." He also highlights "Scream" as the song with which he feels "most at ease," calling it "both divine and human." You can read the whole review here.
Talkhouse not only solicits artists to write reviews of other artists' work, but also encourages the artist who is being discussed to respond to the piece. In the about section, the website suggests that readers can also "join the conversation too" in their moderated comments section. Grimes has not responded, but there are already a few reader responses up.
Will Butler released his debut solo album, Policy, this past March. He shared the video for the single "What I Want" just a few weeks ago; watch it below.
Will Butler has yet to be reviewed by another artist on Talkhouse, but Arcade Fire was reviewed by Annie Clark (St. Vincent) back in 2013; you can read her review, written in a series of Google queries, on the Talkhouse website.
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