Elliott Smith - Elliott Smith

Advantages: beautiful melodies, great guitarist, vocalist, acoustic
Disadvantages: if you are into dance, very upbeat music then this isn't for you.

I absolutely love Elliott Smith. He is one the most influential, beautifully talented acoustic artist around, and as a musician myself his songs have true meaning and inspriation. This self-titled album is soothing, and a great pleasure to listen to. It's less polished and commercial than his other albums, but still has some brilliant classics such as 'coming up roses' 'needle in the hay' 'clementine' 'southern belle' and so many more, I could go ...
...and touch your soul, they reveal and paint the picture of his hard, pained but interesting life.This low production album is mezmerizing, and although takes a few listens to appreciate each song individually, is truly worth buying and having in the collection. Especially if you like acoustic, guitar vocal, lovely melodies, great guitar playing songs. This is the one for you. ... Read review

Advantages: Possibly the finest album of 2000
Disadvantages: The best is yet to come

...It’s quite nice to be the first person to review an Elliott Smith CD and what a fine CD it is to review too. I was amazed to see that he hadn’t been categorised, but hopefully I can spread the word about just how good this singer / songwriter is. “Figure 8”, released in early 2000 is his fifth solo album and in my opinion, his finest yet. It’s not as if his last album “XO” was average, it was brilliant, but the more beefed-up sound of that record has been added too on “Figure 8”. While earlier releases such as “Roman Candle” and “Either / Or” were much more basic in their arrangement and production, “Figure 8” has much more instrumental input and the songs are all the better for this. It begins with a song about a mass murderer... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful

Advantages: Excellent vocals, calm, reflective tracks, Something different to the majority of singer songwriters
Disadvantages: He died shortly before his 7th album

...It would seem that 2005 is going to be the year of the singer songwriter. With the likes of David Gray and Tom McRae leading the way in the last few years a number of other artists have sprung from nowhere. One artist who is now missing out on a movement I've no doubt he would have been at the forefront of, is Elliott Smith. Elliott committed suicide back in October 2003 at just 34 years of age and left behind a wealth of fantastic music. My first introduction to Smith was on the Good Will Hunting soundtrack, where he featured a couple of times and it really stuck in my mind to find out who he was. After a few searches I came across a few more samples of his work and bought this album from Amazon to see just how good he actually was. Despite still having a lot of reservations when the album arrived I put it on and was instantly... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful