Robbie Williams
Intensive Care

THE REVIEW

The "intensive care" alluded to, I don't know if I should undertake it, the ex Take That, or perhaps that endless army of fans who run like delirious mice behind this new four-penny Pied Piper (4 in the literal sense, of course). The album cannot be defined as a bad album, that would be dishonest: everything is well played, perfect in the arrangements, measured and perfectly tailored, with a polished and calibrated interpretation complete with choruses and synths that, unsurprisingly, come in at the points where the climax is at its peak ("Tripping", for example, the summer ballad with lighters in hand and plenty of ole, or "Advertising Space").

In short, if everything is in the right place, what’s wrong? The result is an album cold, glacial, where a "fake" soul oozes, planned at the table, that brutally leverages a series of elements which, since they work, are used in forced use and abuse, as if those pulling the strings of our piper were gray men from dark marketing offices of high-up major labels now determined TO GIVE THE MICE WHAT THE MICE WANT, without allowing themselves the luxury of daring a little more (and if someone like Robbie, who has the flair and potential, doesn't do it, who could?), without even slightly baffling the audience (just a little bit, huh? Because then the business obviously has to return and the album has to be sold, I understand this, indeed), without giving the listener a different possibility to foresee an alternative development of the tracks, a chorus that surprises, a pair of minor chords, in short, the feeling is of an apathetic and terribly predictable album in its homogeneity and flatness.

He had done something much more appreciable with Swing When You're Winning from 2001, with reinterpretations of classic standards in old crooner style and back then, I found the character courageous in his oddity. Back then, it seemed to me that the English lad had found the courage to dive into something more, breaking the wall of banality from the golden Pop Star he had built around himself. And instead?
And instead, he has returned to his old trite and worn-out steps. I repeat, an album with catchy (but not memorable, in construction, execution, or other) tracks that never transcend a bothersome sense of déjà vu in a thousand other similarly watered-down pop albums.

But my reflection is, alas, another: if the fans (or rather FEMALE fans) want THAT Robbie Williams, with THOSE sounds, THOSE little songs, THOSE statements from a spoiled rockstar that babbles sugar-coated banalities good only to placate the hormonal storms of those dull adolescents with tender breasts with their thong-like underwear perpetually protruding from their branded low-rise jeans; in short, if THE PRODUCT is fine, why change it? It is the harsh law of marketing, supply and demand, the Global Market, in short: a winning team doesn't change. And I would agree too. I would agree in the economy, in everyday life. But not in Art, not in Music. Not when talking about emotions, anger, strong feelings, tears that flow real and relentless upon listening to songs perhaps dirtier, less polished (thinking of Tim Buckley or Janis Joplin, but also Radiohead or The Smiths or even the old Pink Floyd), but frighteningly real and eternal. Because the real songs, those that give you goosebumps, those that make your eyes glisten for a moment, those that inexplicably increase your heartbeat for no apparent reason are indeed recognizable and it’s not up to me to explain how. Those who have experienced it know. And they do not reside here, in this cute and pleasant album, which truly feels empty and remarkably like a loud sham.

And every time I look at that cover, it almost seems to me like I'm seeing a loud FUCK YOU with the middle finger raised from the cute Robbie rather than his index finger. But don't worry, do only I see it, perhaps?