{"id":783,"date":"2010-08-13T11:05:52","date_gmt":"2010-08-13T18:05:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/?p=783"},"modified":"2010-08-13T11:05:52","modified_gmt":"2010-08-13T18:05:52","slug":"aqualung-magnetic-north","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/2010\/08\/aqualung-magnetic-north\/","title":{"rendered":"AQUALUNG Magnetic North"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/Magnetic-North-M3-Review-May2010.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-784\" title=\"Magnetic-North-M3-Review-May2010\" src=\"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/Magnetic-North-M3-Review-May2010.jpg\" alt=\"Magnetic North\" width=\"400\" height=\"250\" srcset=\"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/Magnetic-North-M3-Review-May2010.jpg 400w, https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/Magnetic-North-M3-Review-May2010-300x187.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><\/a>A<\/strong><strong>QUALUNG<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Magnetic North<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>[Verve Music Group]<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not surprising that Aqualung leader Matt Hales\u2019 career was kickstarted by a song featured in a Volkswagen television ad. A purveyor of lightly orchestrated piano pop, the Brit-turned-Californian makes populist music that goes down easy and runs determinedly forward. Nothing wrong with that, mind you, but Hale\u2019s yearning falsetto and tinkly melodies\u2014on full display on <em>Magnetic North<\/em>\u2014are flavored with more saccharin than substance. Divided evenly between bouncy, uptempo ditties (\u201cNew Friend,\u201d \u201cFingertip\u201d) and somnolent, lumbering ballads (\u201cSundowning,\u201d \u201cRemember\u201d), the album casts Hale as a two-trick pony. Music fans of a certain age will be reminded of Eric Carmen\u2019s solo work, while the younger set might be put in mind of Five for Fighting\u2019s John Ondrasik. The sole exception is \u201cCalifornia,\u201d a Coldplay-style ballad fitted with cathedral piano, strummed guitar, and a vocal that ratchets down the cloying drama for at least its frustratingly brief minute-and-a-half running time.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013Russell Hall<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>AQUALUNG Magnetic North [Verve Music Group] It\u2019s not surprising that Aqualung leader Matt Hales\u2019 career was kickstarted by a song featured in a Volkswagen television ad. A purveyor of lightly orchestrated piano pop, the Brit-turned-Californian makes populist music that goes down easy and runs determinedly forward. Nothing wrong with that, mind you, but Hale\u2019s yearning [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[196,415,416,70,417],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=783"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":785,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783\/revisions\/785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}