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9.1
57418
9.1 |
Billboard
Joy Williams and John Paul White brought in more instruments, added deeper textures and, in general, upped the intensity of the songwriting for their second effort
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9.0
57415
9.0 |
The Digital Fix
They've made an album that could catapult the duo further into the stratosphere, but perhaps ambitions of the heart (and career) will mean we won't get to see that happen. If so, that's a shame, but what a legacy they leave
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8.3
57409
8.3 |
A.V. Club
The Civil Wars isn’t a great leap forward—it’s significantly front-loaded for one thing, fading through the back half of the album
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8.0
57346
8.0 |
Evening Standard
This is presumably it from them. Looking on the bright side, two promising solo careers are in the offing
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8.0
57373
8.0 |
Slant Magazine
ntimate yet divided, the album alternates between mournful ballads and bluesy rockers, with some country-pop thrown in for good measure
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8.0
57308
8.0 |
Consequence Of Sound
As a whole, The Civil Wars is a more consistent collection than Barton Hollow
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8.0
57312
8.0 |
Uncut
If Williams' voice has star billing, musically much of Civil Wars leans towards White's swampy Southern roots
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8.0
57314
8.0 |
Clash
Serene yet disturbed, this is album that progresses the band well – but with the pair on a seemingly irrevocable hiatus, will that progression lead them anywhere?
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8.0
57317
8.0 |
Daily Telegraph
The Civil Wars offers up 12 perfectly elegant, subtly arranged Americana songs of bad love, misplaced emotion, cheating hearts, fighting and fleeing. Standard country fare, really, but delivered with a kind of po-faced gravity
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8.0
57476
8.0 |
Paste Magazine
The pair refine and expand the sound they architected into a more intense take on their tortured (implied) sexual tension
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8.0
58283
8.0 |
PopMatters
All of this exceptional music, of course, makes it sadder that the Civil Wars are done
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7.0
57316
7.0 |
Rolling Stone
As expressive as their individual voices are, the Civil Wars may well be greater than the sum of their warring parts
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6.5
57723
6.5 |
Under The Radar
White and Williams can still sing the hell out of a tune
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6.0
57325
6.0 |
The Irish Times
Suffused with both grounded emotions and highly strung tension
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6.0
57311
6.0 |
Q
They save themselves from the over-worthy trap by those voices. Print edition only
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6.0
57376
6.0 |
Mojo
In spite of its two-headed musical harmony, the personal disharmony in The Civil Wars is all too evident. Print edition only
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6.0
57385
6.0 |
The Arts Desk
One wonders if producer Charlie Peacock was trying too hard to appeal to an audience hung up on the T-Bone Burnett sound
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6.0
57351
6.0 |
Independent on Sunday
At times, listening to The Civil Wars is like wading through a swamp of still-raw emotion. It is an album that is more haunted than haunting
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6.0
57352
6.0 |
The Observer
These gritted, gnashing teeth are what make Civil Wars songs compelling, even without the tremendous subplot in which Williams and White stop playing nice
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6.0
57460
6.0 |
musicOMH
An album which begins by brilliantly capitalising on its history ultimately ends up exposing how it was derailed by it
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5.0
57471
5.0 |
Spin
Anodyne vocals wouldn't be so damaging if the words being whispered boasted details worth noticing
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5.0
57307
5.0 |
Drowned In Sound
Had you never heard its predecessor it could even be impressive, but by promising us more it has guaranteed us less. This is a limping, bloodless version of The Civil Wars
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4.0
57309
4.0 |
The Skinny
For every drop of glossy appeal there’s a gallon of blandness to swallow first
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4.0
57310
4.0 |
Time Out
Fans will be pleased to hear that, vocally, the pair are as suffocatingly entwined as ever. Others, pondering the real reason for the band’s indefinite collapse, might wonder whether, at the end of the day, they didn’t just irritate the shit out of each other
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4.0
57595
4.0 |
The Scotsman
Sadly fails to make full use of the huge talents at its disposal
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3.0
57503
3.0 |
NME
Too often their over-earnest delivery is unbearable
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