- Critic score
- Publication
- By date
-
Under The Blacklight is by far and away the most accessible album that Rilo Kiley have ever made.
-
Terse and beaty, with Dr. Dre referral Mike Elizondo going half on the baby, this isn't a pop record, but it does avoid guitar-band shapes, sonics and truisms.
-
The L.A. quartet has returned with an album that's teeming with creatively executed ideas, to the point where it almost feels like the band was just using its first three albums to warm up.
-
Every one of the eleven songs attached to Blacklight is a stunner in purely musical terms.
-
Creamy and precise, every coo and arpeggio blows through your ear buds like the ruffle of crisp bills.
-
Ultimately, the change in direction will likely raise a few eyebrows among some diehard fans, which isn't to say the songs here aren't noteworthy in their own right.
-
Long-term Rilo Kiley fans may take their time to warm to Under The Blacklight.... This sees them develop their sound and mature with it.
-
Q MagazineOn an album tat is filled with gems, Jenny Lewis is the crown jewel. [Sep 2007, p.85]
-
Some of these genre shifts work better than others, of course, but the record is so tightly constructed that nothing ever crashes and burns.
-
It's yet more adventurous, a prosperous band's challenge to its comfortable cult.
-
This album is a pleasant surprise disguised as an unpleasant one.
-
SpinLewis' wordplay smartly unspools over the course of a song--with 'Breakin' Up,' she creates a 'Since U Been Gone' for grown-ups, and on '15,' narrates an Internet jailbait vignette without melodrama or moralizing. [Sep 2007, p.132]
-
MojoThis band brings a grubby beauty to a sound imbued with the insidious durability of the Buckingham-Nicks Fleetwood Mac. [Sep 2007, p.105]
-
Under The RadarUnder the Backlight is a confident, assured move by a band unafraid of distancing themselves from the indie rock mopers. [Summer 2007, p.76]
-
Under the Blacklight is at once more ethereal that anything Rilo Kiley has ever managed previously.
-
The rest of Under the Blacklight feels like the Jenny Lewis show and even if this album doesn't push Rilo Kiley to the top, it's hard to deny that it feels like the launching pad for her ascent into true stardom.
-
Ahead of their Electric Picnic date, the LA rockers ditch their mainstream sheen on their fourth album.
-
Under the Blacklight is a brief and often bizarre record, jiggling with artificial rhythm and awash in backup singers imported from 1981.
-
Entertainment WeeklyFor the most part, Blacklight is far too flat to shine. [24 Aug 2007, p.130]
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
-
Positive: 31 out of 52
-
Mixed: 12 out of 52
-
Negative: 9 out of 52
-
Apr 2, 2011
-
Mar 9, 2011
-
EinarJ.May 4, 2008