| Product Summary | | Label: Sire Records | | UPC: 00093624975502 | | Release Date: 6/23/2009 | | Buy.com Sku: 211099746 | | Item#: M4N62M | | Buy.com Sales Rank: 25530 | Format:  CD |
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| Song Listing |  |
Disc 1
| | Song Title | Sample | | 1. Calculation, The ~ Regina Spektor |  | | 2. Eet ~ Regina Spektor | | | 3. Blue Lips ~ Regina Spektor | | | 4. Folding Chair ~ Regina Spektor | | | 5. Machine ~ Regina Spektor | | | 6. Laughing With ~ Regina Spektor | | | 7. Human Of The Year ~ Regina Spektor | | | 8. Two Birds ~ Regina Spektor | | | 9. Dance Anthem Of The 80's ~ Regina Spektor | | | 10. Genius Next Door ~ Regina Spektor | | | 11. Wallet ~ Regina Spektor | | | 12. One More Time With Feeling ~ Regina Spektor | | | 13. Man Of A Thousand Faces ~ Regina Spektor | |
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| | Album Notes and Credits |
Notes & Personnel Info |  | The CD/DVD version of FAR includes two bonus tracks, "Time Is All Around" and "The Sword & the Pen," that are at least the equal of the songs that made it on the regular version of FAR, as well as videos for "Laughing With," "Dance Anthem of the 80's," and "Man of a Thousand Faces." | | Regina Spektor worked with no less than four big-name producers on FAR, all of them with very different backgrounds: David Kahne was her collaborator on 2006's BEGIN TO HOPE; Garret "Jacknife" Lee counts R.E.M. and U2 among his credits; Jeff Lynne's lavish sound is famous on ELO's albums; and Mike Elizondo has worked with Fiona Apple and Maroon 5. It's something of a surprise, then, that FAR sounds so homogenized. On SOVIET KITSCH and BEGIN TO HOPE, Spektor's wide-eyed moments were balanced with darker, knowing songs that kept her music grounded. Here, almost all of the rough or unpredictable edges have been smoothed away, and all that's left is Spektor's sweet, quirky side. | | At times, FAR gets close to being too precious, whether it's putting Spektor's name in all lowercase letters in the liner notes, her dolphin on the otherwise charming "Folding Chair," or lyrics like "We made our own computer out of macaroni pieces" on the chirpy opener, "The Calculation." Even the album's darker tracks, such as the percussion-heavy "Machine," are surprisingly sugary compared to her previous work. However, Spektor's guileless voice and delivery allow her to get away with sounds and ideas that would be cloying in the hands of almost any other artist. She manages to make a song with the chorus "Eet, eet, eet" catchy and affecting, and fashions an observant and witty story out of returning a wallet to Blockbuster Video. Still, FAR's best moments occur when Spektor turns down the whimsy a few notches |
Producer: David Kahne; Jacknife Lee; Jeff Lynne; Mike Elizondo |
| | Compilation Appearances |
| | Technical Info | | Release Date : 06/23/2009 | | Original Release Date : 2009 | | Catalog ID : 519396 | | Label : Sire Records (USA) | | Number of Discs : 1 | | Studio/Live : Studio | | SPAR Code : n/a | | UPC : 00093624975502 |
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| | Professional Reviews | | Rolling Stone (p.77)
- 4 stars out of 5 -- "FAR matches KITSCH's rococo flow with the follow-up's pop smarts....'Laughing With' begins as a meditation on God's wicked sense of humor and end collapsing in an existential freakout over a soft beat and weeping cello..."Spin (p.88)
- "[I]t's 'Folding Chair,' which refines Spektor's blend of classicist flourish and pure pop sense, that best encapsulates her talents and gnarly eccentricities." Billboard (p.34)
- "With her third Sire album, FAR, Spektor again shows how original she is, finding the gleam in modern life with its contradictions and confusion in a uniquely colloquial manner." Record Collector (magazine)
(pp.94-95)
- 4 stars out of 5 -- "Darker themes are explored...delivered in a a deceptively sweet voice that sugar-coats the sinister heart of her subject matter." |
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| | Bio | | | Regina Spektor A mere five years ago, Regina Spektor was hypnotizing small crowds at hole-in-the-wall venues on New York 's Lower East Side. After playing hundreds of shows in and around NYC, Spektor became the talk of the burgeoning music scene. Though she was selling many copies of CDs she had recorded and produced with friends (11:11 and Songs), it was her next album, Soviet Kitsch, that would become her calling card. Originally released as a CDR and handed out at shows, Spektor signed with Sire Records who re-released Soviet Kitsch in 2003. While touring nationally and abroad in support of Soviet Kitsch, Spektor began as an opening act but by year's end was the main attraction. Going from 200-capacity venues to selling out 1,300 capacity-venues like New York's Irving Plaza and London's Shephard Bush Empire, this Russian-born chanteuse's songs have gone from being burned in her bedroom to receiving a worldwide fanfare. Though in love with playing shows to her rapidly growing audience, Spektor had written hundreds of songs since Soviet Kitsch and was eager to get back into the studio. Abandoning her usual method of production and opting for a new experience, Spektor holed herself up at New York Noise Studios in NYC's Meatpacking District with seasoned producer David Kahne (Paul McCartney). Spending two months during the summer of 2005 working on her fourth release (this new album is also considered her major label debut), Spektor had the opportunity to experiment "until a little Frankenstein was born." Taking two months to record was a huge amount of time by Spektor's standards, since she had recorded her Songs record in 1 day and Soviet Kitsch in 10. "To work like this had been a dream of mine, but I thought it would be years before it happened. I definitely tried to put every aspect of myself into it. We played with wires and sounds, set the lab on fire a bunch of times, laughed and started again." "Before I even started I knew I was going to experiment with things I've only thought about, like beats and drums," explains Spektor, a multi-instrumentalist. "I really wanted to play with electronic instruments and bigger arrangements. Still, on this record, there are some songs where it's really sparse. You don't want to arrange just for the sake of arranging. I had to be careful so the music wouldn't be more fun to make than to listen to."
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