| Are You Alone? | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | October 16, 2015 | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 43:32 | |||
| Label | Matador | |||
| Majical Cloudz chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Singles from Are You Alone? | ||||
| ||||
Are You Alone? is the fourth and final studio album from Canadian pop duo Majical Cloudz, released on October 16, 2015, on Matador Records. [6]
The album was nominated for a Juno Award in 2016. [7]
| Aggregate scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AnyDecentMusic? | 7.7/10 [8] |
| Metacritic | 80/100 [9] |
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [10] |
| Consequence of Sound | B+ [11] |
| Exclaim! | 8/10 [12] |
| The Guardian |  [13] |
| The Irish Times | [14] |
| Mojo | [15] |
| Pitchfork | 8.0/10 [16] |
| Rolling Stone | [3] |
| Spin | 8/10 [2] |
| Uncut | 5/10 [17] |
Are You Alone? received largely positive reviews from contemporary music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 80, based on 18 reviews, which indicates "generally favorable reviews". [9]
Mike Powell of Pitchfork gave the album a positive review, stating, "Like Impersonator , Alone is a sad album, but its sadness is a kind of tall tale, the details of which are overblown for dramatic effect. At times its lyrics sound less like expressions of personal darkness than advertisements for darkness in general, written in lettering so big you could read it from the highway." Powell continues, "Alone is less stripped-down than Impersonator, but it feels less confrontational, too. The band recently went on tour opening for Lorde, and seem to have figured out how to broaden their sound while softening it at the same time, all without losing the detonating high that made Impersonator so remarkable. Songs like "So Blue" and "Downtown"—both standouts—are easy to imagine as more fully fleshed out pieces of music, conveying size without occupying space. Like photographic negatives, you can still see the image but the inversion of blacks and whites lends it a kind of alien melancholy." [16]
Ben Kopel of Flood Magazine wrote of the album: "With this, their sophomore LP about the shaky realities surrounding real love, the co-conspirators have delivered one of 2015’s most honest and moving albums. Lyrically, Welsh explores the doubts and fears that crawl in anytime we open our hearts and lives to anyone—be they family, friend, or partner—with a vulnerability that’s completely comfortable with sounding courageous and unsure in the same baritone breath."
| Publication | Accolade | Year | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Consequence of Sound | Top 50 Albums of 2015 | 2015 | 47 [18] |
| Paste | The 50 Best Albums of 2015 | 2015 | 43 [19] |
| PopMatters | The 80 Best Albums of 2015 | 2015 | 43 [20] |
| Spin | The 50 Best Albums of 2015 | 2015 | 48 [21] |
All tracks are written by Devon Welsh
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Disappeared" | 3:45 |
| 2. | "Control" | 3:21 |
| 3. | "Are You Alone?" | 3:50 |
| 4. | "So Blue" | 3:49 |
| 5. | "Heavy" | 3:29 |
| 6. | "Silver Car Crash" | 3:30 |
| 7. | "Change" | 4:06 |
| 8. | "If You're Lonely" | 3:40 |
| 9. | "Downtown" | 4:09 |
| 10. | "Easier Said than Done" | 2:47 |
| 11. | "Game Show" | 3:19 |
| 12. | "Call On Me" | 3:47 |
| Total length: | 43:32 | |
Weezer is an American rock band formed in Los Angeles, California, in 1992. Since 2001, the band has consisted of Rivers Cuomo, Patrick Wilson, Scott Shriner, and Brian Bell. They have sold 10 million albums in the US and more than 35 million worldwide.
Kenneth Welsh, was a Canadian film and television actor. He was best known as the multi-faceted villain Windom Earle in Twin Peaks, for his roles in the films The Day After Tomorrow, Adoration, Survival of the Dead, and, as the father of Katharine Hepburn, in Martin Scorsese's The Aviator.
Chromeo is a Canadian electro-funk duo from Montreal, formed in 2002 by musicians David "Dave 1" Macklovitch and Patrick "P-Thugg" Gemayel. Their sound draws from soul music, dance music, rock, synth-pop, disco and funk.
Nixon is the fifth studio album by American rock band Lambchop. It was released on February 7, 2000 and was issued by Merge Records and City Slang.
Don't Stop is the second studio album by Norwegian singer Annie. Originally intended for a 2008 release on UK-based label Island Records, the planned release date was pushed back. Annie left Island for Norwegian independent label Smalltown Supersound, which released a revised version of the album in October 2009.
Japandroids are a Canadian rock band from Vancouver, British Columbia, consisting of Brian King and David Prowse.
Claire Elise Boucher, known professionally as Grimes, is a Canadian musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer. Her early work has been described as extending from "lo-fi R&B" to futuristic dance-pop, and has incorporated influences from electronic music, hip hop, and rock. Her lyrics often touch on science fiction and feminist themes. She has released five studio albums.
Visions is the third studio album by Canadian musician Grimes. It was released on January 31, 2012, through 4AD. Her first since signing with 4AD, the album was recorded entirely on Apple's GarageBand software in Grimes' apartment over a three-week period. It was mixed by Grimes and her manager, Sebastian Cowan, at their La Brique Studio Space in Montreal. Visions was streamed on the NPR website a week before it was released in the United States.
Julia Shammas Holter is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, composer, artist, and academic, based in Los Angeles. Following three independent album productions, Holter released Tragedy as her first official studio album in 2011. Ekstasis followed in 2012. After signing with Domino Records in 2013, she released the albums Loud City Song (2013), Have You in My Wilderness (2015) and the live-in-the-studio album In the Same Room (2017). Most recently, her double album Aviary was released in 2018.
Dream Songs is the debut solo album by Canadian musician Devon Welsh. It was self-released through digital download on August 24, 2018 on Welsh's own label You Are Accepted. It was Welsh's first studio album as a solo artist since he and producer Matthew Otto concluded their musical project Majical Cloudz in 2016.
Majical Cloudz was a Canadian music group from Montreal consisting of singer-songwriter Devon Welsh and Matt Otto. The group disbanded in March 2016.
Canadian singer and songwriter Grimes has released five studio albums, one remix album, one DJ mix, three extended plays (EPs), fifteen singles, four promotional singles and twenty-two music videos. Born and raised in Vancouver, Grimes began recording experimental music while attending McGill University in Montréal, where she became involved with the underground music scene.
U.S. Girls is a Toronto-based experimental pop project formed in 2007, consisting solely of American musician and record producer Meghan Remy. She had released music on a variety of independent record labels before signing to 4AD in 2015.
Impersonator is the third studio album by Canadian pop duo Majical Cloudz, released on May 21, 2013, by Matador Records and Mythryl Records. It was their first album on Matador after signing with the label in February 2013. It was also the group's first album to feature producer Matthew Otto as a member, following the departure of Matthew E. Duffy after the release of II in 2011.
Freetown Sound is the third album by Dev Hynes recording as Blood Orange. It was released on 28 June 2016, three days before its originally announced release date of 1 July 2016. The album contains guest appearances by Empress Of, Debbie Harry, Nelly Furtado, Kelsey Lu and Carly Rae Jepsen. The album cover is a 2009 photograph titled Binky and Tony Forever by American artist Deana Lawson.
Half Free is an album by U.S. Girls, the solo project of Toronto-based American musician Meghan Remy. It was released on September 25, 2015, through 4AD record label. Inspired by Sebastian Junger’s memoir War and described by its press release as "an honest and lyrically jarring exploration of emotions, drenched in a bath of raw beats and loops," the album features contributions from Remy's husband Slim Twig, producer Onakabazien, Ben Cook of Fucked Up, Amanda Crist of Ice Cream and Tony Price.
Devon Welsh is a Canadian singer and songwriter. From 2010 to 2016, he was the frontman of the electropop duo Majical Cloudz. He released his debut solo album, Dream Songs, in 2018.
Severe is the fourth album by Australian experimental trio, My Disco, which was released via Temporary Residence Limited on 30 October 2015. It was short-listed for the 2015 Australian Music Prize.
