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Vivian Girls (album)

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Vivian Girls
Studio album by
ReleasedMay 2008 (2008-05)
RecordedJanuary 2008
StudioCivil Defense League (Brooklyn, New York)
Genre
Length21:27
LabelMauled by Tigers
Vivian Girls chronology
Vivian Girls
(2008)
Everything Goes Wrong
(2009)
Singles from Vivian Girls
  1. "Wild Eyes"
    Released: 2008[1]
  2. "Tell the World"
    Released: 2008[2]

Vivian Girls is the debut studio album by American indie rock band Vivian Girls. It was released in May 2008 by the label Mauled by Tigers.[3]

After Mauled by Tigers' limited pressing of 500 LP copies quickly sold out, Vivian Girls was reissued on CD and LP by In the Red Records on October 7, 2008.[4] It was reissued again by Polyvinyl Record Co. in 2019, alongside its 2009 follow-up Everything Goes Wrong.[5]

Composition

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Vivian Girls has been described by critics as an album of lo-fi[6][7] and noise pop[7][8] music. Paste's Henry Freedland said that it exhibits Vivian Girls' fusion of art punk and shoegaze-pop,[9] while NME noted the presence of garage rock elements.[10]

Critical reception

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Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
SourceRating
Metacritic80/100[11]
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[8]
The A.V. ClubA−[12]
Blender[13]
NME8/10[10]
Paste8.0/10[9]
Pitchfork8.5/10[14]

Vivian Girls was met with favorable reviews from music critics.[11] The album holds a score of 80 out of 100 on the review aggregation website Metacritic, based on 15 reviews.[11] NME stated that "between the omnipresent slabs of reverb, the trio flip between harmonic garage rock, gloomy melodies and twee-Birthday Partyisms".[10] Jesse Darlin' of Plan B praised the songs' melodies as "all hard and spiky on the outside and gooey on the inside, like tough girl music should be."[15]

At the end of 2008, Vivian Girls was named the ninth best album of the year by Rough Trade,[16] while Pitchfork listed it as the year's 16th best album.[17]

Legacy

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Despite being polarizingly received when it was released, Vivian Girls has since grown in status. In a 10th-anniversary retrospective, Stereogum's Patrick D. McDermott dubbed it "an all-killer-no-filler introduction to an awesome band". McDermott wrote of audiences' desire to hear "something catchy but not polished, raw but not mean" in music beyond the "pastoral-sounding boy bands and Coachella-band psych" common at the time. He felt that this was briefly provided by noise pop's late-2000s resurgence, of which the album contained "22 of [its] messiest and most influential minutes".[7]

Track listing

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All tracks are written by Vivian Girls (Katy Goodman, Cassie Ramone and Frankie Rose)

No.TitleLength
1."All the Time"1:57
2."Such a Joke"1:43
3."Wild Eyes"1:55
4."Going Insane"1:29
5."Tell the World"3:36
6."Where Do You Run To"3:15
7."Damaged"2:06
8."No"1:19
9."Never See Me Again"1:41
10."I Believe in Nothing"2:26
Total length:21:27

Personnel

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Credits are adapted from the album's liner notes.[18]

Vivian Girls

Additional personnel

Charts

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Chart (2008) Peak
position
US Heatseekers Albums (Billboard)[20] 44

References

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  1. ^ Sendra, Tim. "Vivian Girls". AllMusic. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  2. ^ "Vivian Girls – Tell The World – 7"". Woodsist. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  3. ^ Caramanica, Jon (August 21, 2008). "Punks, but Really Romantics at Heart". The New York Times. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  4. ^ Stosuy, Brandon (August 1, 2008). "New Vivian Girls – 'Where Do You Run To'". Stereogum. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  5. ^ "Vivian Girls announce Memory, first new album in 8 years out 9/20 – listen to 'Sick' now + fall tour dates". Polyvinyl Record Co. July 16, 2019. Retrieved June 19, 2021.
  6. ^ Welsh, April Clare (April 12, 2011). "Album Review: Vivian Girls – Share the Joy". Drowned in Sound. Archived from the original on March 5, 2021. Retrieved March 3, 2021.
  7. ^ Jump up to: a b c McDermott, Patrick D. (October 1, 2018). "Vivian Girls Turns 10". Stereogum. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  8. ^ Jump up to: a b Sendra, Tim. "Vivian Girls – Vivian Girls". AllMusic. Retrieved October 18, 2018.
  9. ^ Jump up to: a b Freedland, Henry (October 14, 2008). "Vivian Girls: Vivian Girls". Paste. Retrieved October 18, 2018.
  10. ^ Jump up to: a b c "Vivian Girls: Vivian Girls". NME. 2008.
  11. ^ Jump up to: a b c "Vivian Girls by Vivian Girls Reviews and Tracks". Metacritic. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  12. ^ Heller, Jason (January 13, 2009). "Vivian Girls: Vivian Girls". The A.V. Club. Retrieved October 18, 2018.
  13. ^ Sheffield, Rob (November 2008). "Vivian Girls: Vivian Girls". Blender. Vol. 7, no. 10. p. 78. Archived from the original on October 4, 2008. Retrieved October 18, 2018.
  14. ^ Granzin, Amy (October 3, 2008). "Vivian Girls: Vivian Girls". Pitchfork. Retrieved October 18, 2018.
  15. ^ Darlin', Jesse (October 2008). "Vivian Girls: Vivian Girls". Plan B. No. 38. p. 71.
  16. ^ "Albums of the Year". Rough Trade. p. 1. Archived from the original on July 16, 2011. Retrieved February 21, 2010.
  17. ^ "The 50 Best Albums of 2008". Pitchfork. December 19, 2008. p. 4. Retrieved October 18, 2018.
  18. ^ Vivian Girls (liner notes). Vivian Girls. Mauled by Tigers. 2008. MBT 004.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
  19. ^ Jump up to: a b c Lindsay, Cam (September 28, 2008). "Vivian Girls". Exclaim!. Retrieved March 3, 2021.
  20. ^ "Vivian Girls Chart History (Heatseekers Albums)". Billboard. Retrieved October 20, 2018.
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