Well, three years after the release of “Skyfall” and four years after the release of her last album, "21," Adele is back and releasing her new album "25" next month! It’s going to be really exciting to see how she has grown as an artist in these past few years.
Firstly, I really like the new single. A lot of people look at her "21" album and generalize her style based off of that album. It makes sense, seeing how successful the album was. It was the best-selling album of 2011 and 2012 in the US and Canada. This was the first album to achieve this since Michael Jackson’s "Thriller" (the best-selling album of 1983 and 1984). But looking at her album "19," Adele is a lot more diverse stylistically then we give her credit for. And the new single definitely shows this.
Her new song “Hello” is, in my opinion, a perfect example of how artists like Adele can integrate a “pop” sound. The sound of this record isn’t over-produced or super complex. But somehow, the producer, Greg Kurstin, has achieved an incredibly simplistic “pop ballad” sound. Things like the choice of reverb, the light underlying percussion, the subtlety of the synth pads and strings, and the elegance of the background vocals really make this track sound like a modernized 90s ballad, and it’s awesome!
The track isn’t overwhelmingly loud or anthem-like, but it has just the right amount of soul to keeps you listening to what it is she’s singing.
Adele has called this album a “make-up” album, and I certainly do get this tone from the first single. She’s not writing about being a victim this time around, she’s writing an apology. This is a new Adele that we haven’t seen. It’ll be interesting to see where she goes with the tone of the whole record.
With a large number of production collaborators she hasn’t worked with yet, it’ll be interesting to see how the album turns out. There are also some indications that a certain Bruno Mars has contributed some of his writing chops on one of the songs.
Starting November 20, Adele’s new album will hit shelves, and it’s going to be big. I hope it’s worth the wait.
