Changing Of The Seasons

Folky baroque pop. Ane Brun is a Swedish pop phenom with folk roots. She sounds like she is somewhere in between Joanna Newsom and Feist vocally. The music is warm, but fragile and sometimes dark. The production is full and interesting, most of the time. It is guitar and voice oriented, but most of the time augmented by lovely string sections, and touches of organs, pianos, and marimba. Unfortunately, a lot of the songs sort of blend together in style and thematic content. Most of the album is pretty strong; if some filler was axed and some ideas were expanded upon this could be incredible. FCC clean.

1. Really poppy song, with a catchy chorus that reminds me of some recent mainstream pop song, light percussion (3:22)
2. Piano, backing vocals add to fragile guitar line, strings, chorus is strong, with presence of strings (3:42)
3. Mid-tempo folk with a prominent marimba in a rapidly sang chorus, tense piece (2:55)
4. Organ foundation underneath, delicate folk tune(3:02)
*5. Piano, prominent, repetitive backing vocals, upfront lead vocals, light percussion, poppy tune, strings and instrumentation is very rich (3:20)
*6. Lovely, warm folky intro, slow, moving, organ and backing vox add to the mix, title track (4:48)
7. Another slow, folky intro with some piano, percussion rumbles in background, strings, organs timidly approach (3:42)
8. Faster tempo, greater pop focus, rich strings, sort of does not really go anywhere (3:05)
9. Piano intro, not folky, waltzy, interesting baroque pop piece with some vocal acrobatics during chorus (3:51)
10. Light percussion add to this piece, giving it a relaxed feel, very rhythmic piece with guitar part, bells, and backing vocals (3:40)
11. Dynamic song with vocal focus, gorgeous instrumental bridge, horns briefly make an appearance (3:30)
*12. A really excellent track with powerful upper register vocals, driving percussion (as driving as it gets for folk pop), great lyrics, and poppy instrumentation (4:05)
13. Soft piano tinkling, vulnerable vocals, really warm, pretty song, great instrumental interlude and excellent use of strings here (2:53)
14. This is a cover of a Cindi Lauper song; sort of is haphazardly placed; it is probably better than the original but track placement is a little strange, piano-driven, minimalistic piece with great vocals(2:21)