Golden Hour

A beautiful listening experience and truly the best of her albums!

As usual, Kacey Musgraves absolutely knocks it out of the park, and I love every single song on this album! Wholesome, enjoyable, relaxing, and overall a solid album. Kacey has expanded on her sound compared to previous albums, adding in slightly more orchestration and alt-rock sounds like synths, electronic drums, more reverb, etc, but her core country sounds of acoustic guitars and banjos, are still very prominent. I'm not a big modern country fan, but her lyrics are fantastic, relatable, fun, and the content is original and nothing like the cliche bro-country rubbish littering the country scene today. Her voice is fantastic, exhibiting great control and confidence across her entire register; great highs and lows while not overdoing it. I'd say half of the songs are very chill and relaxed, while the other half are fairly upbeat and energetic. The entire album makes you want to sit back, put your feet up, light up some Mary Jane, smile, and bob your head. For the vinyl version, the clear record is very nice with no warping, no pops, no skips, overall just a great pressing. The jacket is a gatefold with really great artwork. The mellow blue on the front and back really sets the tone for the entire album, feeling good, chill, and bright. This has been my most anticipated album of the year so far, and it has gone above and beyond my expectations. Really great record.

I read a lot of mixed reviews for this record, so I almost didn't buy it. I thought I might as well give it a chance though, since Amazon has an awesome return policy. But! I was pleasantly surprised, so I thought I'd come back to spread the word. The vinyl I received is a clear/transparent pressing. Unlike other reviewers, my vinyl does not include black smudges or markings within the vinyl. (It sounds like maybe one/some of the factories making a prior run had that issue.) I imagine some of that is probably down to luck of the draw, determining which factory made the copy you end up with. I've seen other reviewers complain about the sound quality, noting an abudance of skips during play. Thankfully, I can report that I've listened to this album several times now, and no skips! I do sometimes wonder whether people who report lots of skips are playing their vinyl on those suitcase record players... nuff said? Anyway. Amazon's an imperfect beast, but this album is flawless.

Thank God that this Cd was good. After a very good 1st CD, "Same Trailer Different Park", her 2nd CD, "Pageant Material", seemed to be the result of her record company twisting her arm to release songs that she had on hand that she knew weren't good enough, but since she was "hot" her new adoring fans would buy anything. Well, you can only milk that cow once or twice before goes totally dry. What fan wants to be ripped off twice? But this 3rd outing was not anything like that 2nd dud CD. Three years had gone by and I suppose it toughened her up. She penned these songs, but also brought in a lot of collaboration. It reminds me of Leeann Womack's latest CD, "the Lonely, the Lonesome and the Gone", which was great and also had a lot of collaboration. In "Golden Hour", out of 13 songs, I like 8, and of those 8 I am going to put 5 on my practice list. Those five are "Slow Burn", "Oh What a World", "Love is a Wild Thing", "Happy and Sad", and "Rainbow". Maybe "Mother" too, since its short. Maybe "Butterflies" too, because, while it is perkier than I usually like, it does have some musical complexity that is redeeming. Heck, why not "Wonder Woman" too. I looked at the popularity of the individual sales of the tracks and was surprised that "Happy and Sad" was not doing that well. It is a complex and beautiful song, and may take a few plays before you realize how good the song is, sort of like "Keep it to Yourself" from her first CD, which I now regard as the best cut from that record.

What a beautiful and soulful voice Kacey Musgraves has! This is a fantastic album and I enjoy listening to it often.

"Golden Hour" is the best album released in 2018. I never heard of Kacey Musgraves before this album and now I own everything she has done and think of her as one of my favorite artists. I am not much of a psychedelics taking person, but I was intrigued by the story of the songs resulting from a trip Kacey took and "Slow Burn," one of those songs, is a standout track. So much of modern country music is so one dimensional, but what I love about this album is while it is country, it sounds so fresh and different in ways it's hard to describe and define, but when you listen to it you know how amazing it feels. "Lonely Weekend" is my favorite song on the album, but "Oh what a world" is the most original sounding song I have heard in ages. "Space Cowboy" is the greatest breakup song ever. There is not one track on this album that I don't love completely. Kudos to Kacey Musgraves for making one of the best and most original sounding albums I have heard in years. I cannot stop playing this album, the songs stay in my head, and I think if you are reading this you should buy this album right now!

Kacey Musgraves es probablemente una de las artistas mas interesantes de la musica country actualmente. Sus anteriores discos reconocidos y galardonados son para mi impecables. Con "Golden hour" se produce un giro mas pronunciado hacia el "Country pop" pero practicamente la totalidad de los temas estan a la altura de trabajos anteriores.

Kacey Musgrave is a 29 year old country singer/songwriter from Golden, Texas. "Golden hour" is Musgrave's third album released in March 2018. The preceeding albums were "Same Trailer Different Park" in 2013 and "Pageant Material" in 2015. Those albums were very much country albums and it seems like she has grown quite a following since her debut was released now having over 400 thousand followers on Twitter. I came across Musgrave after watching a review on you tube of the album on ARTV. Jon who is the presenter of the chanel was so enthusiastic about "Golden hour" and made me want to check this album out. And I have to say I was totally blown away by it. After 2 listens I was telling my mum about her and looking to get tickets for her concert. I loved the way my mum described her by saying she is like Taylor Swift but better. Now if that is not a compliment of the highest level of compliments I don't know what is! The thing is while I would compare Kacey's previous albums to Taylor Swift's earlier albums. This album is more in the direction of people like Katie Melua or Norah Jones. What I mean by this is that it's more showing off her voice and her range. Rather than being country, for the large part of the album I would say it's more easy listening. And when I say easy listening I really do mean it. This album will make you feel like you are on a sailing boat, relaxing in the calmist of waters. The first track "Slow Burn" is the first track on the album and the first track I heard by Musgraves. This track instantly drew me in as her vocals were just so pure and even after many many listens I still get the same buzz when I hear this song. I love one of the lyrics in this song as she sings about when the sun is going down in Tennessee, the people in Beijing are just getting up for work. Like she must have actually done the research for that lyric. I appreciate the effort anyway. :-) Kacey is well known for her lyrics though and this album like her others still has Kacey's views of the world. And the world is quite a common topic. She just seems overawed with her surroundings, the album just oozes happiness and just being grateful for her situation. One of the stand out songs on the album which really sums this up is "Oh what a world". The song starts of with an electronic voice over which I have only ever heard used on Linkin Park's album "A thousand suns". Bet you never thought you'd hear Linkin Park written in the same sentence as Kacey Musgraves! There are probably other artists which use this technique too. It works well as an introduction and when she starts singing "Northern lights....." , again total goosebumps. But I think the actual chorus is the best part. "Oh what a world........and then there is you" , then this amazing bit of acoustic guitar kicks in. This really does sum up the album and as I said before exactly how happy she is with her life at the moment. "Lonely weekend" is another track I really like and follows a great list of artists such as the Bluetones, Craig David and the guys who wrote the theme song to "Happy Days". How does she follow this list of random artists. This song goes through the days in the week! A great track. "Space Cowboy" and "Velvet Elvis" are other worthy mentions. There is a song though which destroys the label of this album being easy listening but in a good way. "High horse" is a really upbeat pop number. Even if the lyrics are about someone being full of themselves and killing the party kind of a person. It shows a different side to Kacey and is song that proves if she wants to go more in the direction that Swift went down she is more than capable of doing it. Overall this is an absolutley cracking album and it's one of those albums when you do ratings out of 5 you have to re-think other albums you gave 5 stars too. As this is one of the best albums I have listened to this year. I am looking forward to really getting into her 2 previous albums more. But I think the thing about this album showed which the other 2 didn't as much is just how good a singer Kacey is and it is exciting to see what the future holds for her.

久しぶりにすごいCDを購入した。この人のCDは他に２枚ほど持っているが、このアルバムは今まで以上に素晴らしい。リアンライム以来の若いシンガーだと思う。

There is a laid back vibe, and some chill grooves running thru the 13 songs on this disk. You quickly realize why this recording was on many critics Top 10, 20, 50 and 100 lists for best music of 2018. Her four Grammy statues in 2019 proved that she was on the right path with these winning songs. Someone should give her a ribbon. You're captured by the initial guitar chords and her lush voice from the first track "Slow Burn" and then it just continues upwards from there. Kacey, with her co-producers / collaborators Ian-Fitchuk and Daniel-Tashian have put together some great music that will stand up over time, and yet infectious enough to keep you coming back to this recording. There are a numerous snippets of music within the songs that keep you interested, be it Kacey's main vocals, or the stacking, doubling and pads of the back ground vocals by Kacey and Daniel. There are also many instrumental bits that will grab you thru this recording, e.g the banjo on Butterflies and High Horse, the vocoder and pedal steel on Oh, What a World. The catchy bass and guitar hooks on 'High Horse', the Celeste on Love Is a Wild Thing and the strings on Happy and Sad. The song crafting of Golden Hour keeps these songs stuck in your head all day long, and for days after that, and sometimes well into the night while you try to fall asleep. Taylor Swift has said Shake It Off, well Kacey Musgraves is saying Shake It Up! Some country music fans may not like this collection at all as it moves too far outside the lines of country music's stale, tiredness and predictability. That being said, there is a mention of a cowboy, a pick-up truck, and a horse so some country music fans may find solace in that. Kacey Musgraves is blazing her own trail and defining country music on her terms and we are better for it. Jump on board, saddle up and submerge yourself into the musical journey she will take you on with Golden Hour.

È da circa un anno che ho scoperto questa cantautrice fantastica, ma mi sembra di conoscerla da sempre. Golden Hour è uno degli album migliori (se non addirittura il migliore) che io abbia ascoltato in questi ultimi 10 anni. I suoni che escono ascoltando questo CD hanno un potere calmante che difficilmente si trova in altra musica. Kacey è un'artista country molto fuori dagli schemi, e persino nel suo ambiente viene purtroppo snobbata per i temi che porta, ma ciò non l'ha frenata dal vincere con questo album 4 premi grammy stra meritati. E a me il country non fa impazzire, ma lei ha una voce talmente delicata e pura che ti ci perdi. È un piccolo gioiello in un mare di tanta immondizia musicale. Non vedo l'ora di ascoltare il suo prossimo lavoro.