Review Summary: Hopefully I don’t get sent straight to hell for this.
The following is an excerpt from the Wikipedia page for the album:
“Wake Up! Music Album with His Words and Prayers is a progressive rock album by Pope Francis released on 27 November 2015 on Believe Digital. The album is formed of speeches by Pope Francis recorded in numerous locations worldwide between 2013–15 with accompanying music tracks of prayers and hymns by various Italian artists and producers.”
Now. You probably have many questions, and I will do my best to answer the majority of them promptly.
Yes, the Pope made an album. No, the title is not some sort of joke. Yes, it features a plethora of musicians and producers and…
Alright, yes, I suppose it’s actually a prog album.
Techincally it’s a prog album. But technically it’s also world music, spoken word, christian rock, gospel, and even experimental. It’s progressive that the Pope actually seriously released an album containing
music, in the same way that it’s progressive that the Catholic Church thinks that gays shouldn’t be burned at the stake anymore. But… that’s progress, I guess?
Your next question: Is it good? Well, no. Not really. It’s certainly interesting, and sometimes features solid music that is far catchier and more immediate than one would expect. Other times it’s sleepy and sounds like it was composed in the 15th century.
The main problem the album faces is that every time you start actually getting into a track musically, the Pope breaks in and starts preaching in Latin or some other language. I hope I don’t go to Hell for this, but frankly it’s goddamn annoying as all fuck.
To be fair, there are plenty of interesting, even great musical moments throughout. The asian vibe of opener “Annuntio Vobis Gaudium Magnum!” (try saying that five times fast), the surprisingly metal riff of “Wake Up! Go! Go Forward!” (also known as the English one (which strangely enough was recorded in South Korea)), there’s certainly something to enjoy here. It’s just that the album seems to be stuck in an eternal split personality disorder.
There is not one instance where the speech and the music blend seamlessly and actively benefit each others existence, creating what feels like a strange war between the two goals of the album. On one hand, it wants to be a spiritual music album, sharing with us the power that music can have around the world when influenced by God. On the other, it wants to spread the Word directly through the “voice of God”, Pope Francis. But, even through all the power of Jesus, it can’t do both at once.
The mixing of the two doesn’t help either. For example, “Salve Regina” has only music playing for the majority and then carelessly a speech is thrown in as if they forgot the Pope was on this album. The music plays on in the background, until someone must’ve accidentally hit the slide all the way down (probably after falling asleep due to the old man mumbling about God in a language they didn’t understand), leaving an awkward and empty silence beneath Francis’s words.
And while the concept of having each song feature music from one part of the world with a speech in the native tongue is an interesting one, it suffers from one major problem: who the hell speaks Spanish, Portuguese, Latin, and English,
and has the likelihood of recommending your album to their friends before toppling over of old age? It’s just a slim target audience if we’re being honest.
All joking aside, in actuality the entire Catholic faith is one of the largest demographics you can target. It’s just that if you honestly tried selling this to the Big G-O-D’s fanbase, it would either fly over their heads due to its severely out-of-touch genre or they just wouldn’t understand the thing at all.
That being said, it really is hard to think of anyone who will listen to this seriously. But we all know why some of us would go out of our way to give it a listen: pure novelty value.
So heed my words: This is not a funny, so-bad-it’s-good album that you can laugh at constantly while you listen. If you’re genuinely curious to hear it I won’t dissuade you, as you may be pleasantly surprised by it’s occasional flashes of cleverness and moving musicianship. But most of the time you may be bored out of your mind; it’s nearly impossible to listen to it all in one sitting.
It’s a strangely misguided album for something allegedly guided by the hand of God, and it honestly wouldn’t work even if was just the music; it all gets far too scattershot and repetitive when it’s all said and done. Despite those aforementioned flashes, banality wins out by the end, and you’ll feel like you’re listening to the same track over and over again.
Treat it not as a novelty, but as a curiosity. One that’s only scarcely better than spending in hour sitting in church.
