Search - Family Fantastic :: Nice

GRRROOOOVY BABY!!!

Tony Amato | Brooklyn, NY | 02/28/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I know I'm about a year late on this rating, but I couldn't resist putting "my 2 cents in" after I read the other reviews on this CD.Before I give my opinion of this album, I want to ask this question to those saps that gave this CD a 1 star rating..."WHAT RECORD WERE YOU GUYS LISTENING TO?"In no way is this album in the "1 star" neighborhood. It's too creative, it's too funny, and the music is too irritatingly catchy. This is a must have if you're an Erasure, Yaz, Depeche Mode Fan. But don't make the mistake of buying this album expecting it to sound like Erasure either. When you listen to this album you realize that all Vince is doing is recreating the 70's funk-adelic Disco scene, while spoofing at the fact of how shallow some of those lyrics were back then. You also realize the type of music that inspired and influenced Vince Clarke, you can actually hear the resemblance in some of the songs in this album to his earlier material with Yaz, and Erasure's Wonderland Album. And for all you poor souls that didn't get it (the 1 Star raters) the last song of the album "Better Days" (very Erasure-esque) was to underline what the album was all about. Enough said, I'm sure for those of you who will buy this CD will play it over and over again. You won't be able to get those tunes out of your head.And to all due respect to Andy Bell, for those who said that "Vince is nothing without Andy" let me ask you this...Where would Andy be without Vince and Erasure?I said my piece."

Nice? Hardly.

Tony Amato | 05/24/2000

(1 out of 5 stars)

"First of all, let it be said that I am a hardcore Vince Clarke fan, with an Erasure vinyl/CD collection that would rival the best. Yaz, Depeche Mode, The Assembly...I could reel off every line, every note. Which is why Vince's last two musical efforts (Pretentious with Martyn Ware and now this.....) have been such huge disappointments to me. I can easily see how Vince would want to branch out and create different styles..but the originality and enjoyable melodies that are his trademark were, I think, sorely lacking in these two albums. "Nice" starts out well - in fact all the songs start off well - with his standard bleeps and beats and the underlying joie de vivre that is a Vince Clarke musical theme....However, the melodies and singers on Nice are ruinous. It is middle school chorale soloists singing horror movie nursery rhymes. I can understand the idea of a "fun, disco, everybody-on-the-dancefloor" compilation of songs....but this album reeks of a group of drunk people cramming into Vince's studio one rainy afternoon to screech songs they thought up the night before in the nearby pub....I would have maybe been happy paying a couple of bucks for this (for the first song "Get Up" which is halfway decent), but I could have done a lot of things with $16.99 plus tax. Two New York martinis at $9 a pop would have been much more enjoyable with a much longer effect..."

VINCE DOES IT AGAIN! EAR CANDY SUPREME!

former TV Addict | Chicago, IL United States | 04/15/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Okay, so you like erasure. Maybe you like disco. Maybe you have a pulse. If you can answer YES to any of the above, you have no choice but to buy this CD. Shut up, enter your credit card number, and buy it. Express it even. I really don't know how you're sitting there not owning it. Anyway, it's the very best of Vince's synth work blended with heavy disco influence, and those sexy backup chicks from the wild tour ( i think? ) anyway, it's badass. the disco thumps, the synths sparkle, and the vocals are great! yeah, i miss andy, but hot damn, these boys and girls can SING. you still haven't bought it? stop reading this review and buy the freakin' cd already!"