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- Summary: The fifth and final volume of Stereolab's Switched On compilation features unreleased tracks, demos and non-album singles.
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- Record Label: Warp
- Genre(s): Pop/Rock
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Score distribution:
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Positive: 6 out of 7
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Mixed: 1 out of 7
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Negative: 0 out of 7
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Sep 2, 2022Though a handful of tracks fall into the category of fun but not essential, Pulse of the Early Brain feels more necessary than some of the previous Switched On volumes. As it covers a wide swath of the band's career, it provides a few surprises for even the most avid fans -- and whether listeners are hearing these songs for the first time or the first time in a long time, they sound equally great.
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Sep 2, 2022Most of the material on this fifth volume of Switched On studiously avoids the trappings of pop music, so hearing this Emperor Tomato Ketchup single as a coda underscores how Stereolab’s music is the product of careful choices and planned adventure, a combination that often produces compelling results as Pulse Of The Early Brain makes plain.
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Sep 2, 2022At times challenging, at others familiar and accessible, it demonstrates that 30 years after their debut album, Stereolab continue to surprise and reward, their unabating influence threading through every recess of left-of-centre modern music. Perhaps Stereolabesque is a fair term after all.
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UncutSep 2, 2022Worth the price alone is the inclusion of their peerless ’97 Nurse With Wound collaboration “Simple Headphone Mind”/“Trippin’ With The Birds”, half an hour of sublime Neu!-sozzled psych as Steven Stapleton caresses the ’lab’s “Long Hair Of Death”. [Oct 2022, p.48]
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MojoSep 2, 2022Seen from 2022, Stereolab's sheer breadth of endeavour here can justly be vaunted as heroic. [Oct 2022, p.100]
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Sep 6, 2022Even though the 3xLP/2xCD set jumps backward and forward in Stereolab’s timeline, the result is a fairly comprehensive portrait of their development from their initial motorik nihilist assault to the pop molecules of their later work.
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Classic Rock MagazineSep 2, 2022This fifth edition's half-hour documents their second collaboration with Nurse With Wound and never fully recovers. [Sep 2022, p.83]
Score distribution:
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Positive: 1 out of 1
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Mixed: 0 out of 1
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Negative: 0 out of 1
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Sep 6, 2022
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