''Pastoral'' is the third

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

by English electronic music project

Gazelle Twin Elizabeth Bernholz (née Walling), b. 1981 in Canterbury, England, and better known by her stage name Gazelle Twin, is an electronic music composer, producer and musician who is currently based in Leicestershire, England. She is unsigned and re ...

of composer, producer, and musician Elizabeth Bernholz. It was released on 21 September 2018 by Anti-Ghost Moon Ray Records. Two singles were released to promote the album: "Hobby Horse" and "Glory", both accompanied by music videos.

Background

Originally, ''Pastoral'' was to be based on "the bizarre desires related to objects" but the idea got rejected later on. On the album, Bernholz was inspired by rural life as well as Brexit. She defined the album as her "re-addressing what it means to be English in the face of changing political mood".

Critical reception

At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews, ''Pastoral'' received an average score of 81, based on 11 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim". Bekki Bemrose of

Drowned in Sound ''Drowned in Sound'', sometimes abbreviated to ''DiS'', is a UK-based music webzine financed by artist management company Silentway. Founded by editor Sean Adams, the site features reviews, news, interviews, and discussion forums. History ''D ...

stated that the album is "a towering work that truly distils all of its maker's talents into a unified whole", giving the album a score 10 out of 10. PopMatters' Spyro Stasis called ''Pastoral'' a "sardonic reconfiguration of avant-pop" that "re-interprets electronic music through an early music/folk lens" while writing in his review that it is "bizzare" in "the most positive way" and that "its amalgamation of traditional musical concepts within this futuristic pop structure is what makes it so enticing." The album was ranked as the best album of 2018 by The Quietus adding that it is "a disquieting listen", and "Gazelle Twin shows us that any romantic idea of England is a poisoned chalice".

Accolades

Track listing

Personnel

Credits adapted from the liner notes of ''Pastoral'' and Bandcamp page.

Musicians

* Gazelle Twin – composition, recorders, percussion, vocals * Dave Mooney – performance

Technical

* Gazelle Twin – production, recording, mixing * Shawn Joseph – mastering

Artwork

* Gazelle Twin – artwork *

Jonathan Barnbrook Jonathan Barnbrook (born 1966), is a British graphic designer, film maker and typographer. He trained at Saint Martin's School of Art and at the Royal College of Art, both in London. Work Barnbrook designed the cover artwork of David Bowie's ...

– typography, layout

References

{{Authority control 2018 albums Gazelle Twin albums