pom pom

by 
AlbumNov 17 / 201417 songs, 1h 7m 3s99%
Hypnagogic Pop Psychedelic Pop
Popular

With 17 songs and over an hour of music, *Pom Pom* reminds us of the daring experiments from Ariel Pink\'s formative DIY releases. But the eclectic songwriting, turn-on-a-dime influences and lush production demonstrate just how much the California musician has evolved. Sure, the album is all over the place—we’re warmed by the ‘60s-influenced pop sunshine of “Plastic Raincoats in the Pig Parade” one moment and tangled in the knotty guitars of \"White Freckles” the next. But the everything-at-once aesthetic is held together by an undercurrent of electro melancholy that’s most evident on icy, synth-based tracks like \"Picture Me Gone” and the ultra-poised “Lipstick\". As the mosaic ends with the bittersweet shimmer of “Dayzed Inn Daydreams”, *Pom Pom*’s kaleidoscopic beauty leaves our head spinning.

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8.8 / 10

A decade ago, Ariel Pink crept out of his rented room in an ashram off Crenshaw with reels of spindly, self-destructing love songs. On his new album, the CalArts alumnus remains the stylistic next-of-kin to Frank Zappa: satirical, divisive, and more interested in terraforming genres than neatly deconstructing them.

B

Ariel Pink was probably the prototypical home recorder of the ’00s on his Haunted Graffiti series of albums. He swore allegiance to R. Stevie Moore while nodding to Daniel Johnston and Guided By Voices by virtue of his melodic instincts alone. He favored inchoate pop gems obscured by tape hiss and rudimentary…

9 / 10

There’s evidence of pretty much everything he’s been called on ‘Pom Pom’.

6 / 10

A frustrating, occasionally marvelous record that has us yearning to see a little less of Ariel Pink the madcap collaborator and a little more of Ariel Pink the man.

6.9 / 10

With the Ariel Pink news cycle for this release, the actual album, pom pom, is nearly lost in shuffle.

Pom Pom's knockout track is "Put Your Number in My Phone," a buttery slice of California guitar poetry and playa-listic arrogance that perfectly sums up the Pink magic: The man might skeeve you out a little, but the tune is pretty irresistible.

Overbearing and frustrating from the get go, it feels like he’s taking the piss.

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This double album magnum opus from the one-time king of lo-fi haunted graffiti is essentially an Ariel Pink best-of, albeit with an entirely new batch of songs. And the whole affair is as throwaway and tremendously enjoyable as you might expect from an album with songtitles such as Nude Beach A G-Go, Exile On Frog Street and Goth Bomb.

7 / 10

The first half or so of pom pom proves Ariel Pink is still a pretty formidable songwriter.

8.0 / 10

Even those who detest Ariel Pink's think piece-baiting persona will likely admit that, on some level, the L.A. pop savant is an important artist. New generation ironists Mac DeMarco and Foxygen simply wouldn't exist without him.

5.0 / 10

Ariel Pink cuts a pretty divisive figure in indie music circles. His work over the last decade has oscillated wildly between beautiful weird wisps of '70s soft rock and off-kilter absurdist pop that's so aggressively strange it's practically littered with

Shocking Pink? This uneven, cutesy, solo-centred album is bordering on the creepy, says <strong>Kitty Empire</strong>

8 / 10

8 / 10

9.0 / 10

Review of 'pom pom' by Ariel Pink, by Northern Transmissions the album comes out on November 17th via 4AD, the first single is "Put Your Number In My Phone"

Ariel Pink can write genuinely melodic tunes when he wants to. The trouble is he just wants to get on your wick

85 %

[xrr rating=4.25/5]Few other musicians define “difficult artist” quite like Ariel Pink.

3.5 / 5

Ariel Pink - Pom Pom review: The greatest of the sadists and the masochists too