''Dedication'' is the second studio album by British electronic music producer

Zomby Zomby is a British electronic musician who began releasing music in 2007. He has released music on several labels, including Hyperdub, Werk Discs, and 4AD. Zomby's influences include oldschool jungle music and Wiley's eskibeat sound. Car ...

, released on 11 July 2011 through

4AD 4AD is a British record label owned by Beggars Group. It was founded in London under the name Axis Records by Ivo Watts-Russell and Peter Kent in 1980 as an imprint of Beggars Banquet Records. The name was changed to 4AD after the release of th ...

. The album's first single "Natalia's Song" was embroiled in controversy in early 2012. Electronic producer Reark claims he wrote the loop that comprises the main portion of the song in 2007, and that he was not credited by Zomby for his contribution; in response, 4AD later amended the track credits to include Reark's name.

Critical reception

''Dedication'' received positive reviews from

music critic '' The Oxford Companion to Music'' defines music criticism as "the intellectual activity of formulating judgments on the value and degree of excellence of individual works of music, or whole groups or genres". In this sense, it is a branch of m ...

s. At

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an

average In colloquial, ordinary language, an average is a single number or value that best represents a set of data. The type of average taken as most typically representative of a list of numbers is the arithmetic mean the sum of the numbers divided by ...

score of 79, based on 28 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Dave Simpson of ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' gave note of the "pensive, thought-provoking sadness" throughout the record's production, highlighting the melodies as being reminiscent of the "dark, inverted negative synthpop of the

Human League The Human League are an English synth-pop band formed in Sheffield in 1977. Initially an experimental electronic music, electronic outfit, the group signed to Virgin Records in 1979 and later attained widespread commercial success with their t ...

and the "minimal pianos and bare clonks" having a mixture of

Keith Jarrett Keith Jarrett (born May 8, 1945) is an American pianist and composer. Jarrett started his career with Art Blakey and later moved on to play with Charles Lloyd (jazz musician), Charles Lloyd and Miles Davis. Since the early 1970s, he has also be ...

and Spooky that's "somewhere between dubstep and contemporary classical", concluding with, "But however you define it, its beautiful atmosphere of sadness and decay is hard to deny." ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

''s Andy Gill praised Zomby for utilizing a minimalist approach to electronic music throughout the track listing, while also adding substance to them, concluding that "there's a pervasive haunted sense of loss and melancholy that links these 16 tracks together, giving ''Dedication'' a depth and elegance not often found in more dance-focused dubstep." Randall Roberts of the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

'' said that, "Each of the thousands of individual beats, bumps, dots and dashes on ''Dedication'' sound forged with a sculptor's eye for form and shape, crafted and shined until they glisten." Alex Young of ''

Consequence of Sound ''Consequence'' (previously ''Consequence of Sound'') is an independently owned New York-based online magazine featuring news, editorials, and reviews of music, movies, and television. History ''Consequence of Sound'' was founded in Septem ...

'' felt that "this latest offering from the spectral producer proves much more enduring a record than he seemed capable of a couple of years back and one that makes as solid a case as is imaginable for integrating dubstep into the mainstream as one of the genre's first great releases on a label not named

Hyperdub __NOTOC__ Hyperdub is a British electronic music record label and former webzine based in London, founded by Kode9, Steve Goodman, a.k.a. Kode9. The label was formed in 2004, and grew out of the UK's early dubstep scene. Artists signed to the l ...

or NinjaTune." ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork or hay fork is an agricultural tool used to pitch loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. It has a long handle and usually two to five thin tines designed to efficiently move such materials. The term is also applie ...

'' contributor Jess Harvell said that despite lacking elements from previous works she commended Zomby for crafting "the most stylistically wide-ranging record he's released yet," giving praise to his evolution from "game cartridge kitsch" to rhythms that are reminiscent of

Boards of Canada Boards of Canada are a Scottish electronic music duo consisting of the brothers Mike Sandison and Marcus Eoin. Signing first to Skam Records, Skam followed by Warp (record label), Warp Records in the 1990s, they received recognition following th ...

, saying that its "in many ways the work of a producer pushing himself to see how hard and how far he can push his music into new places." She added that listeners might be put off by the musically varied tracks containing two- or three-minute runtimes that hint at something lengthier and more fleshed out. Matt Oliver of '' Clash'' wrote that, "His quill inviting tomes of humbling electronic stealth to lash out in cold blood (the pure grime 'Vortex' is an open invite for emcees to taunt and insult over), and as skittish as the suspicion of his persona affords, 'Dedication' will raise more questions than provide answers. Exactly the 'out of the palm' manoeuvre Zomby wants you to eat from." Mark Davison, writing for No Ripcord, said, "Zomby may have the potential to be the most brilliant, versatile British electronic musician since Richard D. James, but his distant, maverick act does him few favours here – what he needed was somebody to sit him down and tell him to focus on one idea at a time. As it is, Dedication seems like a bit of a missed opportunity; as a collection of ideas it may be incredible, but as an album it's just insubstantial." It ranked at number 8 on '' Spin''s "20 Best Dance Albums of 2011" list. The magazine's writer Michaelangelo Matos said that "''Dedication'' has plenty of bang in its back end, but its early, slower tracks are what lodge in your mind's ear, whether it's Zomby cutting a Russian pop singer into haunted phenomes on "Natalia's Song" or Panda Bear crooning over the squiggly skank of "Things Fall Apart.""

Critical reception

Track listing

Charts

References

External links