Katie Armiger – Gone
Texan teen doesn’t exactly bring the house down…
[Video][Myspace]
[3.60]
Erika Villani: You know how sometimes, during the early rounds of American Idol, a contestant will forget both the words and the melody to a song, and just stand on stage with wide eyes, bleating jumbled phrases, and there are all sorts of awkwardly timed pauses, and the notes they’re singing go nowhere and have no relation to the music playing behind them? If you really enjoy that, then this is the song for you.
[1]
Anthony Miccio: A country singer heads off to follow her star and chase her dream, unaware that her SUV is dragging from the weight of her voice.
[4]
Pete Baran: But from the rear-view mirrors breaking her heart to the dreams that are only what she can make of them you don’t believe a word.
[2]
Iain Mew: For someone who apparently has to catch her future before it loses her, this really is awfully slow, isn’t it? It’s such a slog to get to the end that it feels like there should be some great reward for doing so. No such luck though, just a more concentrated version of Kate’s irritatingly wobbly emoting.
[3]
Anthony Easton: Great voice; once she learns how to control the excess, might be interesting.
[5]
Martin Kavka: She won a competition? But she’s a quarter-step flat for almost the entire song!
[1]
Martin Skidmore: I like her in the upper register, but she sounds rather flattened at the bottom.
[6]
Chuck Eddy: Easily the dullest — slowest, most devoid of personality, most hookless, most lyrically so-what — country track we’ve graded here since I came on board. My points are for the space they seem to be trying to get into the sound (to hear it done right, try Sarah Buxton’s appropriately named “Space”), and for Katie’s singing, which shows potential. A youtube comment calls her “a younger Martina McBride”; not sure I buy that, but if she ever gets ahold of an “Independence Day” or “This One’s For The Girls” or “When God-Fearin’ Women Get The Blues” or “Wild Rebel Rose” (best song on Martina’s 2009 album), we’ll see (though I can also imagine Martina singing this song, and sounding just as meh).
[4]
Ian Mathers: It’s really a shame that the video is gaudy and saccharine in ways the song mostly avoids – I mean, her voice is rather huge and this kind of “I’m going to live my dreams!” narrative is always kind of overblown but in rhetoric and performance “Gone” is a lot more appealing than something like “The Climb”. Nice use of strings near the end, too.
[6]
Michaelangelo Matos: We’re gonna get a bunch of these Taylor Swift clones, aren’t we? Shudder.
[4]