翻譯：Nomanlandever

原文鏈接：http://robertchristgau.com/get_artist.php?name=billie+eilish

專輯綜評

• Dont Smile at Me?[Darkroom/Interscope EP, 2017]?B+

• When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go??[Darkroom/Interscope, 2019]?A

• Happier Than Ever?[Darkroom/Interscope, 2021]?A

  
  

Dont Smile at Me（不要對我笑）?[Darkroom/Interscope EP, 2017]
Billie's songwriting is still juvey here, Finneas's production still in the learning stage. Yet those gobsmacked by the album are now equipped to go back to first appreciate and then savor Eilish's RIAA-certified singles and their EP pals. I doubt I'll ever find the quietly murderous "Bellyache," say, much more than a sublimated tantrum, bummer, existentialist gesture, whatever. But none of these interpretations render it anything close to unlistenable, carried as it is, like the whole wittingly makeshift collection, by her still-fragile melodies and still-pure voice.?B+

盡管Billie的創(chuàng)作能力還很青澀，F(xiàn)innea的制作仍處學(xué)習(xí)階段。但那些對這張專輯驚艷得目瞪口呆的聽眾早已開始迫不及待地欣賞Billie Eilish的多首白金單曲和EP舊作。我懷疑以后再也聽不到"Bellyache"這樣的暴力美學(xué)作品了，洗滌靈魂的暴躁，郁悶，存在主義者的姿態(tài)，諸如此類。但對這些負(fù)面情緒的詮釋卻沒有讓整首歌曲變成不堪入耳的噪音，歌曲像是精心拼湊的合集，充滿不變的弱化旋律和依舊清澈的歌聲。B+

When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go??（當(dāng)我們睡了，怪事發(fā)生了）[Darkroom/Interscope, 2019]
Slotting this self-created 17-year-old as pop computes musically and commercially while reminding us how amorphous that once snappy term has become. Her soprano too diminutive for vocal calisthenics, her sensibility too impressionistic to bother mapping out track-and-hook bliss points, Eilish is a home-schooled Highland Park weirdo whose darkly playful version of teen-goth angst had already captivated millions of young weirdos-in-potentia before this electro-saturated debut album put in its bid for the rest of us. Seldom catchy in any conventional sense, every one of these 14 tracks entices the ear anyway, from "Bad Guy"'s "duh"s to "Xanny"'s blown speaker cone to the shuddering sound-pit that swallows "You Should See Me in a Crown" to the plinked piano of "All the Good Girls Go to Hell" to the tunefully cooed "Wish You Were Gay," and it keeps going. Only then it closes shut when one of the least self-glorifying suicide songs ever sets up a finale comprising songs titled simply "I Love You" and "Goodbye"--each quiet, each pretty, each what it says, each sad without ever turning gruesome or crossing its fingers.?A

將這位17歲青少年的作品歸類為流行樂，無論是從音樂性還是商業(yè)上都講得通，這也提醒我們（流行樂）這個詞看似簡單實則變化莫測。她的高音過于微弱，她的敏感過于自我，以至于很難打造出歌曲hook的神來之筆。Billie Eilish是接受家庭教育的有錢怪小孩，在這張扣人心弦的electro（電子合成舞曲）十足的專輯發(fā)行前，她黑色幽默版的青少年哥特式焦慮音樂早已喚起數(shù)百萬青少年潛在的怪誕心理。專輯全部14首歌幾乎不是傳統(tǒng)意義上的“抓耳”——“bad guy”里的“duh”，“xanny”里轟鳴的揚聲器，“you should see me in a crown”里吞噬一切的地獄級震顫聲、“all the good girls go to hell”叮當(dāng)作響的鋼琴聲、“wish you were gay”的輕聲細(xì)語，專輯以此循序漸進(jìn)。最后進(jìn)入專輯尾聲，一首最不吹噓的自殺曲“listen before I go”為隨后的落幕曲目“i love you”和“goodbye”做好鋪墊。兩首靜謐，美麗，不帶陰森恐怖感的悲情歌曲。A

Happier Than Ever（怪樂的不得了）?[Darkroom/Interscope, 2021]
Because she enjoyed the incomparable distinction and suffered the incomprehensible burden of sweeping the Grammys at 17, ordinary life will be out of her reach for a long time. So unless and until she elects to go public with romantic encounters I hope she enjoys and applaud her for concealing via "NDA," quote unquote because "NDA" is an actual song title here, that leaves her with one subject: stardom and its discontents, a privilege and dilemma it would seem impossible to say anything new much less interesting about. Only then out of sheer candor she does. "Things I once enjoyed/Just keep me employed now/Things I'm longing for/Someday I'll be bored of/It's so weird/That we care so much until we don't." Nor is this the only new truism she pulls out of her thoughtstream. How about "I sure have a knack for seeing life more like a child"? Or the meditation on the objectified female body that is "Not My Responsibility"? No wonder the music Finneas comes up with for her is calmer and less sprightly than the stuff that converted the world. But because I'm old enough to feel both concern for a youngster's well-being and awe at her unguarded resourcefulness, that's fine with me. Let's hope her fellow teens feel the same.?A

因為她在17歲無可匹敵的卓越，同時承受著橫掃格萊美的難以理喻的負(fù)擔(dān)，所以在她接下來很長一段時間內(nèi)，平凡都是不可奢求的事物。也因此，除非她選擇公開自己的浪漫情郎，也祝愿她能享受愛情，或者通過“NDA”（保密協(xié)議）隱瞞真相而繼續(xù)贏得喝彩，因為“NDA”的確也是專輯里的一首歌曲名稱，也留下一個主題：璀璨星途下的不滿，特權(quán)，似乎必須說俏皮話的難堪。但當(dāng)她赤誠袒露心聲時（”Getting Older“歌詞）“Things I once enjoyed/Just keep me employed now/Things I’m longing for/Someday I’ll be bored of/It’s so weird/That we care so much until we don’t.（曾使我樂此不疲的事物/現(xiàn)在只是我謀生的工具/我夢寐以求的事物/總有一天會使我厭煩/很奇怪/我們曾經(jīng)如此在意現(xiàn)在卻漠不關(guān)心）當(dāng)然她的感悟也不限于此。（“Everybody Dies”歌詞）“I sure have a knack for seeing life more like a child”（我總能像孩童一樣剖析生活），和“Not My Responsibility”中物化女性身體的沉思，這些想法是否讓你對她刮目相看？怪不得她哥哥Finneas為她打造的音樂更為鎮(zhèn)定不活潑，與什么扭轉(zhuǎn)世界的音樂相比。但已足夠年老的我既關(guān)心她的身心健康，也對她卸下防備的內(nèi)在想法刮目相看。但愿同齡的青少年能與她感同身受。A