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Tarfumes.com - Brand New Day
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List Price: $13.98
Our Price: $10.97
Your Save: $ 3.01 ( 22% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Interscope Records
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Audio CD
EAN: 0606949044329
Label: Interscope Records
Manufacturer: Interscope Records
Number Of Discs: 1
Publisher: Interscope Records
Release Date: 1999-09-28
Studio: Interscope Records
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Editorial Reviews:
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There is a difference between being an inspired musician and an informed musician. Sting is the latter. As always, he surrounds himself with ultratalented artists: this time around Stevie Wonder, Branford Marsalis, James Taylor, guitarist Dominic Miller, and the prince of rai Cheb Mami, fill the roster. Brand New Day exhibits about as many musical styles as there are tracks, all encased in dense, meticulous production. The album begins promisingly. "A Thousand Years" pulses atop a lush, two-note foundation. "A Desert Rose" folds trilling Algerian pop into trip-hop. Melodic, late-night jazz ballads dominate the middle portion of the collection. But Sting's preoccupation with odd-numbered time signatures prevents the songs from grooving, while the choruses are yawns. "Fill Her Up" (no, not "Fill 'Er Up"), a country tune, represents Sting at his most self-indulgent. Listening to one of the wealthiest musicians in pop singing "Got no money to invest / Got no prospect / Or education / I was lucky to get the job at this gas station" requires a heroic suspension of disbelief. The song morphs into this gospel number where Sting and a supporting chorus chant "You gotta fill 'er up with Jesus! / You gotta fill her up with life!" Who knew unleaded could be so rousing? --Beth Massa
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: a singular touch of grace
Comment: Despite criticism that it is eclectic to the point of distraction (sometimes expressed as `Has Sting run out of ideas?'), BRAND NEW DAY contains several of the finest songs of the entire final decade of the twentieth century. Sting being Sting, you wade through a couple of dry stretches on this album as on almost any of its level. Yet the gems are gorgeous, enduring glimpses of brilliance. The album's opening track, `A Thousand Years', may be the most splendidly lush love song to be performed in twenty years. Pulsing, obsessed with a love whose mathematics defy infinity, Sting in this profound statement of amour knows only one thing: I still love you.
No one creates a new sound like Sting. Among the not always convincing concoctions on a CD that gyrates like the stock market in a very insecure moment, storms forward `Desert Rose'. Sting and Algerian singer Cheb Mami, supported by enthralling orchestration, pull off a profoundly moving piece that must have seemed unlikely to Sting's minders when he unveiled the concept. The lyrics are as evocative as the music itself:
I dream of rain
I dream of gardens in the desert sand
I wake in vain
I dream of love as time runs through my hand
I dream of fire
Those dreams that tie two hearts that will never die
And near the flames
The shadows play in the shape of the man's desire
This desert rose
Whose shadow bears the secret promise
This desert flower
No sweet perfume that would torture you more than this
And now she turns
This way she moves in the logic of all my dreams
This fire burns
I realize that nothing's as it seems
I dream of rain
I dream of gardens in the desert sand
I wake in vain
I dream of love as time runs through my hand
I dream of rain
I lift my gaze to empty skies above
I close my eyes
The rare perfume is the sweet intoxication of love
I dream of rain
I dream of gardens in the desert sand
I wake in vain
I dream of love as time runs through my hand
Sweet desert rose
Whose shadow bears the secret promise
This desert flower
No sweet perfume that would torture you more than this
Sweet desert rose
This memory of hidden hearts and souls
This desert flower
This rare perfume is the sweet intoxication of love
It is a marvel that Sting can sing with his tongue as firmly planted in cheek as `Big Lie Small World' requires. Yet this tune, too, is vintage Sting: funny, cerebral, and self-deprecating all at once, punishing himself for a foolishly lost love and awash in a world of bigger, wealthier Alpha-males ready to harvest the affections of the woman who used once to be by his side
The aptly named `Ghost Story' is a mesmerizing tale of regret, of love handed over too soon to lawyers who know nothing of nourishing such a child. One wishes, in the face of such poetic and musical mastery, to start life over again, to stay as far from this song's conclusion as a human being can know how.
These are high points on an album that begs to be owned and turned over in the hand, held up to the light, from time to time contemplated for the treasure that is in it.
If BRAND NEW DAY signals that Sting has lost his way, then let's follow him off into the bush, for the path has grown cold, unpromising, still.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Technical perspective
Comment: I am a Sting fan, and I am not a professional critic. However, I am a musician and a music student, and I wanted to offer a statement from that perspective.
"Big Lie Small World" has nine beats per measure. The ending (and the entirety of the original version) of "Fill Her Up" is in 7/8. Though not on most albums, "The End of the Game" is in 6/4, or some duple equivalent.
The rest of Sting's career is full of odd time signatures - "Love Is Stronger Than Justice" is in 7; "I Was Brought to My Senses" is in 7; "Seven Days" Is in 5; "Straight To My Heart" is in 7.
What was the last song you heard that wasn't in 4/4? Every once in a while, someone may write a waltz, but when it comes to rhythmic structure, the music on the radio is unfortunately the same. It used to be that when I would speak to my musician friends about music, I would ask them if they could play in a time signature other than 4/4. A vast majority could not!
Just imagine if popular music was limited to songs written in a major key, and songs in minor keys were too dreary to listen to. Or, imagine that all chord changes had to occur directly on the beat without syncopation, or else it would sound jumpy and erratic. Worse yet, imagine that electric guitar, bass, and drums were the only popular instruments. What would music be worth listening to?
There is no end to the stylistic elements that can be incorporated into musical composition. The critic on the main page said that the odd time signatures "prevent the songs from grooving." This is a typical opinion, and unfortunately so. But for once, it is refreshing to hear a contemporary artist who isn't limited to common time.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Sting
Comment: I have 2 copies of this cd. One for home and one for the car. it's the best!!!!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Wonderful complexity and depth....
Comment: Sting continues to press against creative boundaries into new places, with his seemingly effortless marrying of music and vocals.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Best album of the last decade ...
Comment:
A strange boast for sure to say that this album could quite possibly go down as the best album of the past decade as it was released in the waning moments of 1999. I wont forget though, that just a few months later an equally strong release by U2 made possible another contender for a spot on that list of unforgettable albums.
Brand New Day though, as commercial as it is, being in everything from episodes of CSI, Cold Case, NBC promo spots and numerous films, was also in heavy rotation for television commercials as well, foremost the Sting sponsored Jaguar S-Type commercial that featured `Desert Rose'. Stranger still, Sting thought that the album might be missed if he didn't branch out and try to cross-promote his new album in every way imaginable. He talks about this a lot on his All This Time DVD, which is a must see companion piece to this album. Looking back now, he's probably thankful for the check but probably believes he could've done without Jaguar's money (actually Ford Motor company).
It would've been impossible for this album to have faded into the background with songs like `A Thousand Years', `Ghost Story' and `Desert Rose'. The latter is actually my least favorite on the entire album and often gets skipped past. So many songs on this disk are absorbing, well-written, absolutely beautiful and in every way timeless.
Sting then went on to create a very bizarre and telling music video for the Brand New Day title cut which put him in the place of a nuevo-like God from a lost episode of Star Trek which actually turns out to be a (you guessed it) commercial for Laundry Soap called `Day' and yes, it's Brand New! The video ends with the great creator Sting taking a header off of a sound stage in front of a green screen into an impromptu-pool and then having a fit. I only describe this now because it seems to play into the myth about Sting's perceived public persona. The music video and the album does play out to be more introspective then it appears to be on the surface in every facet and weathers incredibly well over time, unlike many of his other albums.
Sting's strong point throughout his career has been his writing and his composition which is now much evident here, though his myriad personality takes a lot of his solo work too-deep into the labyrinth of recording and post-production which seems to get too close to a multi-layered Phil Specter or a bad incarnation of Vangelis with lyrics.
Sting proved through the late eighties and early nineties that he was capable of creating throw away and forgettable albums that were just badly managed. His time during The Police showed his profound abilities and seemed like he'd prove to create a promising solo career, but his early solo work showed a lot of overwrought nonsense that most people just cannot bear to listen to, despite the fan boys. It wasn't until he hit a stride with Ten Summoner's Tales that he really began to show what has come full circle on Brand New Day. Brand New Day seems to be the Sting solo album that everyone was waiting two decades for.
I recently read that Sting had worked on `A Thousand Years' for weeks, trying to develop that sound that hits you like a brick wall as soon as the album fades in. Every song, one after another seem, at least to me, equally thoughtful and always engaging. We may not know for sure now, but I wouldn't doubt that Brand New Day will end up as the high water mark for this man's career. If it is, that's not necessarily a bad thing. If he can best himself, the that will surely be something to hear.
As far as the greatest album of the decade ... this will probably hold the number one spot followed by All That You Can't Leave Behind by U2 and then David Bowie's Heathen, and the Killers Hot Fuss and Jay Z's The Black Album which are all equally masterful and worthy of the number one spot in their own right.
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