It’s crazy that she was just 18 when this debut album came out. Her 2nd album “When The Pawn” is the masterpiece where she found her voice. Check it out.
The fact that she put this album out at 18 (recorded at 17), and even When The Pawn…she was TWENTY TWO!! Just the fact that she had the emotional capacity to identify these complex emotions, analyze them, put them into words, and then turn them into VERY clever, poetic lyrics is MIND BLOWING. That’s not even including the instrumentals, and just the strength of her voice. SO many people have straight up missed the boat on Fiona Apple entirely. I think history is going to remember her as one of the greatest modern musicians of our time. Her lyrics are just SO goddamn clever. The wordplay….”I need to fold because these hands are just too shaky to hold.” Almost every lyric has a clever double meaning. The way she ties the music in with the lyrics and the vocals…there are very few musicians alive today who could even come close to touching her gargantuan talent. The range in her voice as well!! She can sing those super high soprano notes, and then get right down in the dirt with that gravelly deep voice…it’s just absolutely stunning.
Oh no, nobody’s first Fiona Apple album should be Fetch the Bolt Cutters. You kinda have to already be a die hard fan to appreciate that one. Ha. Tidal is absolutely exquisite, tho. And such a strong, bold debut. The next album, When the Pawn, is just as good. Great reaction video. Watch the “Criminal” music video too when you get a chance.
There are many people who got into Fiona based on FTBC. You don’t have to already be a “hardcore fan”. You do however need to have an appreciation for more ambitious, loopier, “less pretty” vocals and production.
I love that "Slow Like Honey" is about the song itself... how the song lures you in slow like honey, heavy with mood. Then the bridge has these wild chord shifts that snap out of the dream, until she languidly stretches across the keys and pulls us back... The way she paints the lyrics in her music throughout that song is really cool.
You should watch videos of her playing live! She's amazing. She's playing piano on these songs btw. Amd she wrote Never Is A Promise when she was 15 years old!
Yeah, it’s still just an album so don’t get overhyped. It is certainly where she built up a lot of good will and why so many were so excited about Fetch the bolt cutters.
Yesss fiona is one of the best song writers ever, so much attitude and anger and her delivery and lyrics , please do when the pawn … it’s my favorite album by fiona , some of the lyrics on there is just straight up poetry 🤍
I told you she is amazing and you should start chronologically with her Tidal. Bolt Cutters is a musicians and fan only album, but her first three are stellar. When I first heard Lana del Rey, I thought "oh, she's like Fiona Apple"
Sorry, but I cannot stand when people compare Lana Del Ray to Fiona. Lana Del Ray’s lyrics are basically just word salad. I feel like she just dumps a bunch of adjectives into a bowl, and mixes them up, and throws them down onto the page, and there a song. lol.
Glad you decided to give Fiona another go. ❤ Pale September is one of my absolute favorites 💯 When the Pawn is another one of hers to check out! Very LA noir vibe haha Idler Wheel is when her sounds starts get more experimental imo. Rawer production, incorporation of field recordings / “found” percussion, stuff like that. But the songs are more accessible than Fetch the Bolt Cutters. My ranking: When the Pawn The Idler Wheel Fetch the Bolt Cutters Tidal Extraordinary Machine
Sullen girl is about her being raped. When she says he took her pearl and left a empty shell of her that’s what the song is about! So glad you are giving Fiona another chance! She is amazing! Her and Madonna are my two Queens!
I always wonder if all the barking on FTBC is just because she really loves her dog, or if it’s because when she was raped, she was all of 12, and it happened in the hallway outside of her apartment, and her dog was on the other side of the wall barking the whole time. God, it’s just so horrific that that happened to her…at such a young age too.
It’s so strange, I Know was always my favorite Fiona song. I never realized how many people love that song until I started reading all these comments. lol
I still haven't connected with "Boltcutters" yet, either. But all her other albums are individual core memories in my brain. This is the stuff that formed me.
Glad you liked this one 🙂. "When The Pawn" is super good, similar to this album but more upbeat. "The Idler Wheel..." is amazing but, imo its when she starts taking a step towards the Fetch The Bolt Cutters "dog barking" sound lmao, substantially more palatable tho. And I'm with you, she lost me on Fetch The Bolt Cutters lol people seem to love it but it left me scratching my head lmao. Great reaction, always good vibes 💖
This poor girl was attacked outside her apartment as a preteen and spent her teen and early adult years suffering from OCD and an eating disorder as a result. I think FTBC was very much her freeing herself from these and other personal and mental health issues that had been holding her back for so long. I'm curious how you'd react to FTBC after listening to the other albums. IMHO, she just got better and better over time. My judgment come from how I emotionally connected to the albums - the music is always a little eclectic and her voice is always a treat.
I’ll never forget when FTBC dropped. I laid in bed with my headphones and listened all the way through two times. I thought: “Omg, I LOVE this, but everyone’s going to hate it.” When I saw the reviews of that album I felt like the world was FINALLY actually hearing and feeling her music. I’m still stunned that it was received so well. I’m also still devastated that she didn’t tour it. (Friggen Covid. 🙄) It just doesn’t sit well with me that I haven’t seen her perform that album live. lol.
I love this album, and it touches on lots of heavy things. The vocab can be a bit thick sometimes kind of like St. Vincent if you’ve ever listened to her. Carrion btw is a word for like decaying material from an animal or like a carcass
I know a lot of people aren’t crazy for it, but Celebrity Skin is one of the first albums that I just played over and over and over again. It’s just a whole vibe. Northern Star is SO good. The music video for Malibu just screams the whole aesthetic of my adolescence.
I remember hanging out at Tower Records and listening to this album at a listening station. I was shocked at the grittiness of her voice in the first song because she looked so dainty in the album’s pictures. I’ve been a fan since then. 😆
You're right about those long outros. When this album came out I was a Drag Queen and performed "Criminal", and when the outro started, i just took my bows and walked off stage.
We want Siiickbrain reaction all singles from her first album comming on the 1st December. Parasite, Die Quietly (mv) Deprecating ft. Maggie Lindemann and Psychopath (mv) I loveee your video so plss its my dream ❤️
Fetch The Bolt Cutters-The Idler Wheel-When The Pawn are her trifecta of great albums imo. Tidal is a solid, cute debut album. But I prefer Fiona much more raw and adventurous. Tidal is a bit too safe and immature for me to really love. It does have a few standout tracks though.
I know I'm an outlier among her fans, but Tidal is still my favorite Fiona album. I do love the whole of When the Pawn..., as well, but the smoky, jazzy, bluesy sound of Tidal is just so comfortable to me and I have never stopped listening to it. The only element I don't love (and this is carried through all her music) is the long, long, loooooonnnnnnng instrumental outros that become tedious to me. But I have heard musicians describe those as a highlight of her music and I am no musician. I appreciate and have respect for her newest albums, but like Björk, Fiona's artistic inclinations have veered away from musical instruments and lovely melodies to favor banging pots and pans and kitchen utensils, howls, squawks, growls and even dog barks to create their strange and often-uncomfortable soundscapes, and while I find these songs interesting and really do appreciate the innovation and creative impulses, I listen to Tidal-the whole album!-25 times as often as I listen to songs from The Idler Wheel or Extraordinary Machine. There's just something about, you know, music that begs repeat listening as opposed to clattering metal and wood objects. I do find it interesting that some musicians like Fiona, who demonstrate young mastery of piano, end up making music almost entirely of percussion as they progress. I'd love to hear her discuss what has driven her bang bang clickety clack evolution because I really can't relate to it.
Yeah, I am a huge Fiona fan, and even I skip over the outros a lot. Oasis is probably my favorite band, and they have endless outros too. Ween too. And The Velvet Underground. Basically all my favorite artists do it, which is ironic. lol.
She wrote never is a promise and several others when she was 15!!! My favorite female songwriter ever. I listened to her when Tidal came out and I was like 14. She is a part of my DNA forever. Tidal is a masterpiece 🩵
Also, for some reason no one ever mentions that Fiona definitely influenced Lana Del Rey. I love them both so much, they’re my fav women in music but Fiona is forever #1 🩵
OMG 😱😩😍 This álbum is part of my Teenage years… she was like 17 when this álbum came out, and its so dark, so deep and intense! Some song (i think “Sulen Girl” and “the child is gone” talking about sexual abuse 🤔 Please, react to the videos from this era… “Sleep To Dream” won a VMA 97 for best video from a New artists (the speech that night is iconic!) And “Criminal” is one of the best video ever made (directed by Mark Romanek who directed “Rain” and “Bedtime story” of Madonna…) so, is a masterpiece! I Really enjoy your reaction, and I’m wanting for more Madonna reaction (the videos from “Ray of Light” era). Cariños y abrazos desde Chile 🇨🇱😊
@@bennshoutsyour fans crave more madonna! We still have 25 more years of materiel for you to get through, you only got through 11 in this past year 😂😂😂
The Child Is Gone is one of my absolute favorites of hers. It’s always interchanging, because it’s just impossible to name an absolute favorite, but I know and The Child is Gone are two that just never get knocked off the docket for me.
Great album. Criminal was the biggest hit. Sullen girl was about dealing with being sexually assaulted. Carrion is one of my favorites. When the pawn... is pretty great follow up album
Her latest album (Fetch the Bolt Cutters) made every other female "edgy" artist out there seem like a simple child. That includes Eilish who's brilliant. But Apple's prodigious piano playing combined with her knack for production puts here in a different stratosphere. She can and should write a musical. That's how good she is at arranging for strings, percussion, and horns.
No offense your reaction is very weird the fact that I don't know I feel like this generation doesn't understand metaphor. You all need to literally be told something and ordered understand I mean a lot of songs even if you don't know really what it means exactly to her experiences that you would at least to your experiences understand it. Shadow boxer is about someone playing you and she's called on to his game you know once my lover and now my friend oh you'll not be with me but you still want to be friends so you can knock at my door and come around whenever you feel like it when you want some and charm the pants off of me but now I've got on to your game you don't get that really
I understand metaphors, just cause I didn't vibe with every song or understand doesn't mean I don't. A sweeping statement about generations is pretty ignorant and just shows that you've become bitter in your age lol.
It’s crazy that she was just 18 when this debut album came out. Her 2nd album “When The Pawn” is the masterpiece where she found her voice. Check it out.
Cannot believe her age! Truly incredible!!!
The fact that she put this album out at 18 (recorded at 17), and even When The Pawn…she was TWENTY TWO!! Just the fact that she had the emotional capacity to identify these complex emotions, analyze them, put them into words, and then turn them into VERY clever, poetic lyrics is MIND BLOWING. That’s not even including the instrumentals, and just the strength of her voice. SO many people have straight up missed the boat on Fiona Apple entirely. I think history is going to remember her as one of the greatest modern musicians of our time. Her lyrics are just SO goddamn clever. The wordplay….”I need to fold because these hands are just too shaky to hold.” Almost every lyric has a clever double meaning. The way she ties the music in with the lyrics and the vocals…there are very few musicians alive today who could even come close to touching her gargantuan talent. The range in her voice as well!! She can sing those super high soprano notes, and then get right down in the dirt with that gravelly deep voice…it’s just absolutely stunning.
Oh no, nobody’s first Fiona Apple album should be Fetch the Bolt Cutters. You kinda have to already be a die hard fan to appreciate that one. Ha. Tidal is absolutely exquisite, tho. And such a strong, bold debut. The next album, When the Pawn, is just as good. Great reaction video. Watch the “Criminal” music video too when you get a chance.
Haha, I’ve come to realise this 😂
Cannot wait for the next one!
And thank you!!! Xx
True. Tidal is surely the best intro to her artistry
There are many people who got into Fiona based on FTBC. You don’t have to already be a “hardcore fan”. You do however need to have an appreciation for more ambitious, loopier, “less pretty” vocals and production.
Lmao I’m glad I didn’t listen? I remember when it released during the pandemic but yes I started w tidal and currently on when the pawn
I love that "Slow Like Honey" is about the song itself... how the song lures you in slow like honey, heavy with mood. Then the bridge has these wild chord shifts that snap out of the dream, until she languidly stretches across the keys and pulls us back... The way she paints the lyrics in her music throughout that song is really cool.
LOVE this take!!!
pale september bc its my birthday month but never is a promise and shadowboxing are my fave
You should watch videos of her playing live! She's amazing. She's playing piano on these songs btw. Amd she wrote Never Is A Promise when she was 15 years old!
INCREDIBLE!
Let’s go!!! Fiona is a beast of f an artist. Can’t wait until When the Pawn…she is so great live as well, gotta check out her performances.
Pawn is getting hyped!!!
Yeah, it’s still just an album so don’t get overhyped. It is certainly where she built up a lot of good will and why so many were so excited about Fetch the bolt cutters.
Yesss fiona is one of the best song writers ever, so much attitude and anger and her delivery and lyrics , please do when the pawn … it’s my favorite album by fiona , some of the lyrics on there is just straight up poetry 🤍
Cannot wait!
I told you she is amazing and you should start chronologically with her Tidal. Bolt Cutters is a musicians and fan only album, but her first three are stellar. When I first heard Lana del Rey, I thought "oh, she's like Fiona Apple"
Sorry, but I cannot stand when people compare Lana Del Ray to Fiona. Lana Del Ray’s lyrics are basically just word salad. I feel like she just dumps a bunch of adjectives into a bowl, and mixes them up, and throws them down onto the page, and there a song. lol.
Fiona Apple is such a vibe. I love her 3rd album “extraordinary machine” it’s so different. 🙂
EM is SO underrated.
Just wanted to add more hype to "When the Pawn..."
hahah yesssss
Every single one of her albums is a masterpiece. She wrote most of this album when she was under 18 which speaks so much😭🫶🫶
INSANE!!
Glad you decided to give Fiona another go. ❤ Pale September is one of my absolute favorites 💯 When the Pawn is another one of hers to check out! Very LA noir vibe haha
Idler Wheel is when her sounds starts get more experimental imo. Rawer production, incorporation of field recordings / “found” percussion, stuff like that. But the songs are more accessible than Fetch the Bolt Cutters.
My ranking:
When the Pawn
The Idler Wheel
Fetch the Bolt Cutters
Tidal
Extraordinary Machine
SO keen for Pawn, everyone is hyping it up!!
Personally this is my favorite Fiona album but it’s definitely not her best! You will hear her artistic growth in her next album, it’s amazing
Can’t wait!
Sullen girl is about her being raped. When she says he took her pearl and left a empty shell of her that’s what the song is about! So glad you are giving Fiona another chance! She is amazing! Her and Madonna are my two Queens!
Oh wow 😭 Makes so much sense!
I always wonder if all the barking on FTBC is just because she really loves her dog, or if it’s because when she was raped, she was all of 12, and it happened in the hallway outside of her apartment, and her dog was on the other side of the wall barking the whole time. God, it’s just so horrific that that happened to her…at such a young age too.
WHEN THE PAWN and THE IDLER WHEEL pleeeeeeeaseeeee
When the pawn and extraordinary machine are def worth a listen as well
Benn just remember this.. you are not prepared for the song "i know".. basically you will melt
KEEN!!!
It’s so strange, I Know was always my favorite Fiona song. I never realized how many people love that song until I started reading all these comments. lol
I love the simplicity of this album. Timeless and beautiful all the way through.
I still haven't connected with "Boltcutters" yet, either. But all her other albums are individual core memories in my brain. This is the stuff that formed me.
Glad you liked this one 🙂. "When The Pawn" is super good, similar to this album but more upbeat. "The Idler Wheel..." is amazing but, imo its when she starts taking a step towards the Fetch The Bolt Cutters "dog barking" sound lmao, substantially more palatable tho. And I'm with you, she lost me on Fetch The Bolt Cutters lol people seem to love it but it left me scratching my head lmao. Great reaction, always good vibes 💖
YAYYY Idk if u remember my comment on the ftbc video and I don't wanna say I told u so but..... lol so glad u enjoyed it
HAHAHAHA you were right :P
Criminal, The First Taste, & Sleep to Dream are my faves from this album.
This poor girl was attacked outside her apartment as a preteen and spent her teen and early adult years suffering from OCD and an eating disorder as a result. I think FTBC was very much her freeing herself from these and other personal and mental health issues that had been holding her back for so long. I'm curious how you'd react to FTBC after listening to the other albums. IMHO, she just got better and better over time. My judgment come from how I emotionally connected to the albums - the music is always a little eclectic and her voice is always a treat.
I’ll never forget when FTBC dropped. I laid in bed with my headphones and listened all the way through two times. I thought: “Omg, I LOVE this, but everyone’s going to hate it.” When I saw the reviews of that album I felt like the world was FINALLY actually hearing and feeling her music. I’m still stunned that it was received so well. I’m also still devastated that she didn’t tour it. (Friggen Covid. 🙄) It just doesn’t sit well with me that I haven’t seen her perform that album live. lol.
I love this album, and it touches on lots of heavy things. The vocab can be a bit thick sometimes kind of like St. Vincent if you’ve ever listened to her. Carrion btw is a word for like decaying material from an animal or like a carcass
I don't enjoy St. Vincent at all haha!
Oh wow at Carrion!!!
@@bennshouts see that’s so funny to me, the first two albums are eh imo but the self titled one made me love her so much
@@bennshouts😂 i love annie please listen to pay your way in pain
I think you may like it
Omg yayyyy!! SO glad you gave her another chance! After your FTBC reaction I was like “oh yeah he’s DONE done” 😂😂😂
One of the best albums ever made
I absolutely love this album so much but it still ranks third place. That’s how good her other albums are! You are in for a treat!
I like when you do the 90s rock chicks. “Live Through This” by Hole and pretty much all of Garbage’s albums may be up your alley.
That would be iconic
Haha you're isync with me! It's up now!
I know a lot of people aren’t crazy for it, but Celebrity Skin is one of the first albums that I just played over and over and over again. It’s just a whole vibe. Northern Star is SO good. The music video for Malibu just screams the whole aesthetic of my adolescence.
I remember hanging out at Tower Records and listening to this album at a listening station. I was shocked at the grittiness of her voice in the first song because she looked so dainty in the album’s pictures. I’ve been a fan since then. 😆
“The first taste” is beautiful beautiful 🫶🏽
You're right about those long outros. When this album came out I was a Drag Queen and performed "Criminal", and when the outro started, i just took my bows and walked off stage.
HAHAHAHAHAHHA iconic
We want Siiickbrain reaction all singles from her first album comming on the 1st December.
Parasite, Die Quietly (mv) Deprecating ft. Maggie Lindemann and Psychopath (mv)
I loveee your video so plss its my dream ❤️
Fetch The Bolt Cutters-The Idler Wheel-When The Pawn are her trifecta of great albums imo. Tidal is a solid, cute debut album. But I prefer Fiona much more raw and adventurous. Tidal is a bit too safe and immature for me to really love. It does have a few standout tracks though.
I know I'm an outlier among her fans, but Tidal is still my favorite Fiona album. I do love the whole of When the Pawn..., as well, but the smoky, jazzy, bluesy sound of Tidal is just so comfortable to me and I have never stopped listening to it. The only element I don't love (and this is carried through all her music) is the long, long, loooooonnnnnnng instrumental outros that become tedious to me. But I have heard musicians describe those as a highlight of her music and I am no musician.
I appreciate and have respect for her newest albums, but like Björk, Fiona's artistic inclinations have veered away from musical instruments and lovely melodies to favor banging pots and pans and kitchen utensils, howls, squawks, growls and even dog barks to create their strange and often-uncomfortable soundscapes, and while I find these songs interesting and really do appreciate the innovation and creative impulses, I listen to Tidal-the whole album!-25 times as often as I listen to songs from The Idler Wheel or Extraordinary Machine. There's just something about, you know, music that begs repeat listening as opposed to clattering metal and wood objects. I do find it interesting that some musicians like Fiona, who demonstrate young mastery of piano, end up making music almost entirely of percussion as they progress. I'd love to hear her discuss what has driven her bang bang clickety clack evolution because I really can't relate to it.
Yeah, I am a huge Fiona fan, and even I skip over the outros a lot. Oasis is probably my favorite band, and they have endless outros too. Ween too. And The Velvet Underground. Basically all my favorite artists do it, which is ironic. lol.
This album is flawless
honestly my least fav fiona album but sullen girl is perfection, when the pawn is my second fav album of all time tho!!!
Such an incredible song!! Everyone is loving Pawn!!
@@bennshoutsThere’s absolutely a reason for that. When The Pawn…is absolute perfection.
Fiona is the sad girl queen!
Haha yesss
She wrote never is a promise and several others when she was 15!!! My favorite female songwriter ever. I listened to her when Tidal came out and I was like 14. She is a part of my DNA forever. Tidal is a masterpiece 🩵
Also, for some reason no one ever mentions that Fiona definitely influenced Lana Del Rey. I love them both so much, they’re my fav women in music but Fiona is forever #1 🩵
❤️
😘😘😘
OMG 😱😩😍 This álbum is part of my Teenage years… she was like 17 when this álbum came out, and its so dark, so deep and intense! Some song (i think “Sulen Girl” and “the child is gone” talking about sexual abuse 🤔
Please, react to the videos from this era… “Sleep To Dream” won a VMA 97 for best video from a New artists (the speech that night is iconic!) And “Criminal” is one of the best video ever made (directed by Mark Romanek who directed “Rain” and “Bedtime story” of Madonna…) so, is a masterpiece!
I Really enjoy your reaction, and I’m wanting for more Madonna reaction (the videos from “Ray of Light” era). Cariños y abrazos desde Chile 🇨🇱😊
Aww love that it connected with you at such a young age and thank you!!!! ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
@@bennshoutsyour fans crave more madonna! We still have 25 more years of materiel for you to get through, you only got through 11 in this past year 😂😂😂
The Child Is Gone is one of my absolute favorites of hers. It’s always interchanging, because it’s just impossible to name an absolute favorite, but I know and The Child is Gone are two that just never get knocked off the docket for me.
Great album. Criminal was the biggest hit.
Sullen girl was about dealing with being sexually assaulted.
Carrion is one of my favorites.
When the pawn... is pretty great follow up album
Such heavy stuff for such a young chickadee!
Her first four albums are much more listenable than Fetch the Bolt Cutters imo
💙💙💙
Her latest album (Fetch the Bolt Cutters) made every other female "edgy" artist out there seem like a simple child. That includes Eilish who's brilliant. But Apple's prodigious piano playing combined with her knack for production puts here in a different stratosphere. She can and should write a musical. That's how good she is at arranging for strings, percussion, and horns.
Is Carrion here?
No offense your reaction is very weird the fact that I don't know I feel like this generation doesn't understand metaphor. You all need to literally be told something and ordered understand I mean a lot of songs even if you don't know really what it means exactly to her experiences that you would at least to your experiences understand it. Shadow boxer is about someone playing you and she's called on to his game you know once my lover and now my friend oh you'll not be with me but you still want to be friends so you can knock at my door and come around whenever you feel like it when you want some and charm the pants off of me but now I've got on to your game you don't get that really
I understand metaphors, just cause I didn't vibe with every song or understand doesn't mean I don't. A sweeping statement about generations is pretty ignorant and just shows that you've become bitter in your age lol.