![]() It’s not quite offensive but that’s also kind of the problem-much of Woman sounds like music designed by committee, better suited to soundtrack a car commercial than to actively engage the listener (incidentally, Justice do have a pretty strong track record when it comes to landing commercial and video game placements). ![]() In between these throwbacks, we get a lot of middle-of-the-road pop: generically funky melodies, cheesy guitar solos, forgettable vocals, lyrics that are downright embarrassing. At best though, these songs feel like paint-by-numbers versions of Justice’s early singles. “Safe and Sound” and “Stop” both attempt to recreate the winning formula of “D.A.N.C.E.”: stargazing choirs, layers of synths, a generous helping of slap bass. Justice being Justice, they can’t resist trying to land a few big singles and these songs tend to be the least adventurous on the album. And while they remain more willing to violate the rules of good taste (as always, all the faders are at 10 and they continue cramming everything into the midrange), Woman still feels about as “electronic” as RAM does: it largely scans as AM pop, just with more modular synths. Just as Daft Punk did, Justice attempt to envelop the sounds of disco and funk in a full on, unironic embrace. Intentional or not, it’s hard not to see the parallels to Random Access Memories’ pop classicism and militantly analog approach. As with previous Justice albums, Woman is full of earnest vocals, rubber-band basslines and weepy strings, only this time everything sounds much warmer and looser. ![]() They’ve stored away the crates of vinyl once and for all, padding out their synthcraft with live instrumentation and vocalists. Woman, their latest, marks yet another tonal shift away from the leather-clad sonics of their debut and toward the brighter sounds of pop and disco. ![]() To their credit, they’ve hardly stood still: 2011’s Audio, Video, Disco found the act taking a hard left turn toward prog in order to distinguish themselves. That formula worked well in 2007 but now that Daft Punk is active and operating at pop’s highest echelons, does the world still need Justice? That’s the question the scruffy duo have been attempting to answer ever since. ![]()
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