The Daily Spin, November 5
Aly & AJ | a touch of the beat gets you up on your feet gets you out and then into the sun
Welcome back to the Daily Spin, the series in which I review 365 albums during 2023.
Each album will be given a rating on a scale from 0 to 10. You can look at the entire set here. Additionally, you can check out a list of my favorite songs from each album right here.
Album: a touch of the beat gets you up on your feet gets you out and then into the sun (2021)
Artist: Aly & AJ
Link:
It’s a good thing that Aly & AJ are more succinct in their lyricism than they are with their album titles, I’ll say that much.
This is wholly enjoyably pop-rock fare, the sort of stuff that sits right in that pleasant valley just beneath what Carly Rae Jepsen makes - it’s not power pop, not too energetic, but really nice music for a slower morning, something to just drink in and let wash over you.
My largest criticism of the album is that it feels really generic - the Michalka sisters put out their first album in 14 years, and it winds up feeling like I’m strolling through a Sephora for ninety percent of the record. That’s not always a bad thing - I often think that the complaint of ‘mall music’ is somewhat overblown, and I do love some of the songs that I hear walking around retail centers, but I think there’s valid criticism there. Nothing about this record feels particularly memorable.
Influences like Taylor Swift, Jepsen, maybe HAIM - great artists in their own right, and it feels just a little bit like perhaps Aly & AJ wanted to emulate so many talented forces that in doing so, they’ve sacrificed a little bit of their own personalities.
Rating: 7.9/10
Best Tracks: Lost Cause; Paradise
Worst Tracks: Break Yourself