Pygmalion (album)
| Pygmalion | ||||
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| Studio album by Slowdive | ||||
| Released | February 6, 1995 | |||
| Recorded | 1994 at Courtyard Studios in Sutton Courtenay, Oxfordshire, England | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 48:23 | |||
| Label | Creation | |||
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| Slowdive chronology | ||||
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| Professional ratings | |
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| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   |
| BBC | favourable |
| Head Heritage | favourable |
| Pitchfork | 8.7/10 |
| Trouser Press | unfavourable |
| Ultimate Guitar Archive | 9/10 |
Pygmalion is the third studio album by English rock band Slowdive, released on 6 February 1995 by record label Creation. It was the final album before Slowdive disbanded in 1995.
A departure from their previous two albums, Pygmalion incorporated a more experimental sound tilted towards ambient electronic music, with sparse, atmospheric arrangements. All compositions were by Neil Halstead. Lyrics on tracks "Miranda" and "Visions of LA" were by Rachel Goswell.
The cover illustration featured imagery from Rainer Wehinger's graphic notation for György Ligeti's work Artikulation (1958).
The album was remastered and reissued on Cherry Red in 2010, with a bonus disc consisting of demo versions of Pygmalion-era tracks.
Pygmalion has been well received by critics. AllMusic called it "a stylistic masterpiece", while BBC Music echoed similar sentiments, writing that Pygmalion "remains Halstead and Goswell's masterpiece and comparing it to the ambient work of Brian Eno.
Pitchfork noted the change in style, describing the album's tracks as "ambient pop dreams that have more in common with post-rock like Disco Inferno than shoegazers like Ride".
A negative review came from Trouser Press, which wrote that the album "completely lacks all the tension, songwriting, sounds and power of the band's work, leaving only the spatial dimensions", calling it "essentially a solo ambient recording by singer/guitarist Neil Halstead that should have been released under his own name".
The song "Blue Skied an' Clear" was featured on the soundtrack of the 1995 film The Doom Generation.
In 1999, Ned Raggett ranked the album at No. 122 on his list of "The Top 136 or So Albums of the Nineties".
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