| Big Black Coat | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | February 5, 2016 | |||
| Genre | Synth-pop [1] | |||
| Length | 49:47 | |||
| Label | City Slang | |||
| Producer | Junior Boys | |||
| Junior Boys chronology | ||||
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| Singles from Big Black Coat | ||||
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Big Black Coat is the fifth studio album by Canadian electronic music duo Junior Boys. The album was released on February 5, 2016 by the group's new home label City Slang. [2] [3] [4] It is the group's first record in five years. [3]
Following the 2011 release of their previous album, It's All True , the duo spent several years pursuing solo and side projects, which included Jeremy Greenspan's working on music by Caribou and Jessy Lanza. [4] The group's press release cited Yellow Magic Orchestra, Plastikman, Robert Hood, Dan Bell, and ESP's 1986 proto-house track "It's You" as inspirations for the recording. [4] Describing the genesis of the album's title, Greenspan explained:
All the songs were about the guys that I saw down town who were just lonely and walking around. I wanted to give them a voice and all the songs are about guys who are frustrated with their emotional lives, frustrated by women, frustrated by everything. So the coat became a metaphor and an analogy of a way to insulate yourself away from the harshness of a Canadian winter. It's pretty bleak." [5]
Big Black Coat premiered as a live NPR stream on January 27, 2016. [6]
| Aggregate scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AnyDecentMusic? | 7.3/10 [7] |
| Metacritic | 80/100 [8] |
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [9] |
| Financial Times |  [10] |
| The Guardian | [11] |
| The Irish Times | [12] |
| Mixmag | 9/10 [13] |
| Mojo | [14] |
| Pitchfork | 8.0/10 [15] |
| Q | [16] |
| Spin | 7/10 [17] |
| Uncut | 8/10 [18] |
At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 80, indicating "generally favorable reviews". [8] Andy Kellman of AllMusic noted influences from "a pool of old sources, including post-disco, early and raw Chicago house, and the bizarre art-pop of Yellow Magic Orchestra (and graphically from Jesus and Mary Chain's Darklands )" and felt that it "contends with Last Exit as Junior Boys' deepest, most vibrant work." [9] The Guardian 's Lanre Bakare complimented the duo's "ability to mix elements smoothly", [11] while Pitchfork 's Cameron Cook stated that "it's impressive and frankly unusual to see a band five albums into their career experiment with new sounds and actually make it work, but Junior Boys have pulled it off." [15] Stephen Worthy, writing in Mixmag , called it "their most rounded, consistently engaging record yet", [13] and in a separate review for Mojo , he added that "their reunion album fizzes with energy—although it retains the underlying melancholia that defined their previous work." [14]
While noting that the band's "usual affinity for R&B drags on the album's slower numbers", Gary Suarez of Consequence of Sound wrote that "as they depart from their early combination of synthpop and R&B into harder, accented electronics reminiscent of early Detroit techno, Junior Boys push forward with one of their most liberating releases in a decade — and, best of all, they sound happy doing it." [19] Andrew Unterberger of Spin found the underlying "sexual desperation" in the lyrics to be inconsistent, but nonetheless called Big Black Coat a "surprisingly successful reinvention". [17] PopMatters writer John Bergstrom was mixed in his assessment, remarking that the band sound like they "want to be Pet Shop Boys", but that they "need to work on sharpening up that Canadian wit and maybe using 'baby' a bit more ironically." [1]
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "You Say That" | Greenspan | 4:56 |
| 2. | "Over It" | Greenspan | 3:45 |
| 3. | "C'mon Baby" | Greenspan | 4:49 |
| 4. | "Baby Give Up on It" | Greenspan | 4:16 |
| 5. | "M & P" |
| 4:20 |
| 6. | "No One's Business" |
| 2:41 |
| 7. | "What You Won't Do for Love" |
| 5:04 |
| 8. | "And It's Forever" |
| 5:35 |
| 9. | "Baby Don't Hurt Me" | Greenspan | 2:00 |
| 10. | "Love Is a Fire" |
| 5:09 |
| 11. | "Big Black Coat" |
| 7:12 |
| Total length: | 49:47 | ||
| Chart (2016) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| UK Independent Album Breakers (OCC) [20] | 14 |
| US Heatseekers Albums (Billboard) [21] | 22 |
| US Top Dance/Electronic Albums (Billboard) [22] | 7 |
Junior Boys are a Canadian electronic pop group, founded in 1999 in Hamilton, Ontario by Jeremy Greenspan and Johnny Dark. Dark left the project shortly after, and was replaced by engineer Matt Didemus. The duo initially gained critical praise for their 2003 single "Birthday" and 2004 debut album Last Exit. Their work incorporates disparate influences from 1980s synthpop, UK garage, techno, and R&B.
So This is Goodbye is the second studio album by Canadian electronic music group Junior Boys. It was first released by Domino Recording Company on August 22, 2006 in Canada, and on September 11, 2006 in other territories. Junior Boys, now solely comprising the duo of Jeremy Greenspan and Matthew Didemus following the departure of founding member Johnny Dark, recorded the album in Hamilton, Ontario and wrote much of the album's material, with the exception of a cover of the Frank Sinatra song "When No One Cares".
Last Exit is the debut studio album by Canadian electronic music group Junior Boys. It was released on June 7, 2004 by KIN Records in the United Kingdom and on September 21, 2004 by Domino Recording Company in the United States. The album was promoted by two singles: "Birthday" and "High Come Down".
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