Björk: Vulnicura (One Little Indian) There are plenty of great albums based around themes of heartbreak and relationships ending, whether they’re autobiographical (as with Bob Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks) or fictitious (as with Toni Braxton and Babyface’s Love, Marriage & Divorce). Generally, top-tier breakup albums utilize mournful lyricism and pained vocal performances to express longing and sadness. At their worst, they bring in the strings and let atmosphere tell the story for them. Björk goes with the latter, creating an album where mood too often stands in place of memorable songwriting, in spite of the songs being (on average) longer than ever. But on an ambient level, this is plenty beautiful, and based on that, it at least offers more than any Björk release since Medúlla. B
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