Not Worth the Wait

One thing that has always bugged me about ADELE was that she never did anything to stay relevant while taking time to raise her son. Her social media presence was nonexistent, she didn’t do any covers or charity concerts, no major appearances. While I think it’s great she was able to lie low, I feel disrespected as a fan. We’re great when she wants to make money for her art but otherwise, whatever.

I do like that she didn’t do the insane amount of media hype for her new music. We found out she had a new song when the video debuted and we could download it. It wasn’t like Katy Perry doing very dramatic stunts to hype her singles and albums. There it was. Because Adele is incredibly talented, we all accepted it.

Adele said the reason she waited so long to do anything was because she was afraid of making a lackluster product. Unfortunately, I think that’s exactly what she did. There was one song on her album that instantly grabbed me like ‘Turning Tables’ and ‘One and Only.’ River Lea was not good enough to make up for a prolonged absence and an underwhelming record.

Am I saying it’s not good? No. It’s a good record. I don’t think any song on it is bad. But 21 set such a high bar that anything less is disappointing. It’s good and will probably grow on me with more plays but on the first couple of listens, 25 can’t hold a candle to 21. You can’t follow up phenomenal with something that’s just good.