James Blake Trying Times

Critic's Take

James Blake arrives on Trying Times as a craftsman of consistency, assembling a compendium of his best parts rather than chasing trends. Ben Tipple praises the rhythmic simplicity of “Walk Out Music” and the underground fever dream of “Rest Of Your Life”, and highlights the title cut “Trying Times” as a raw lyrical moment that finds him again. The review reads as admiration for a record that pares back density into a curated set of strengths, from soulful experiments like “Didn’t Come To Argue” to the orchestral lift of “Just A Little Higher”. Ultimately, Tipple frames the album as a consistent, thoroughly James Blake statement that doubles as some of his clearest work yet.

Key Points

• The best song work is built from clarity and focused elements, exemplified by the rhythmic simplicity of "Walk Out Music".
• The album’s core strength is its consistent assembly of Blake’s signature parts, balancing club influence, soul, falsetto moments, and orchestral touches.

Themes

Critic's Take

James Blake arrives at Trying Times bruised but lucid, and the best songs here - “Death of Love”, “Feel It Again” and “Just A Little Higher” - carry the album’s emotional weight with quiet force. The reviewer leans into Blake’s knack for pairing sparse arrangements with vast feeling, noting how “I Had A Dream She Took My Hand” and “Make Something Up” find tenderness in minimalism and imagination in small moments. In this frame, the best tracks on Trying Times are those that let sadness breathe, turning personal grief into communal consolation. Overall the record feels like a beacon of hope in hard moments, songs threaded together by elegiac synths and blunt, beautiful observations.

Key Points

• The best song, “Feel It Again”, stands out for its powerful, melancholy rumination on grief and lost connection.
• The album’s core strengths are sparse arrangements, emotional clarity, and Blake’s ability to turn societal critique into intimate songs of hope.

Themes

Critic's Take

Irene Monokandilos hears James Blake returning to a melancholic center on Trying Times, where the best songs - “Walk Out Music” and “I Had a Dream She Took My Hand” - turn private collapse into strange, aching beauty. The review treats “Walk Out Music” as a harrowing opening, a blunt mantra that sets the record’s stakes, while “I Had a Dream She Took My Hand” is called the album’s centrepiece, imagining connection as ascent then loss. There is praise for how tracks like “Days Go By” marry heartbreak to dance-leaning music, and for Blake’s restraint: small details and empty space become atmosphere. Overall the critic positions these as the best tracks on Trying Times because they distill the album’s fragile, lived-in intimacy into vivid moments.

Key Points

• The best song is "I Had a Dream She Took My Hand" because it is framed as the album’s centrepiece and delivers the clearest emotional ascent-then-collapse.
• The album’s core strengths are its restrained production, vivid small details, and the way empty space becomes atmosphere for fragile intimacy.

Themes

Critic's Take

James Blake arrives on Trying Times as a quietly simmering fire, and the best songs on the record underline that mood. The opener, “Walk Out Music”, croons wonkily and sets the tone, while “Death of Love” folds Leonard Cohen into a fragmented meditation that ranks among the album's most ravishing moments. The Dave collaboration “Doesn't Just Happen” functions as the coiled spring at the heart of Trying Times, tense and unsettling. These tracks show why searches for the best songs on Trying Times point to Blake's blend of stillness, beauty and roiling rage.

Key Points

• The best song is “Doesn't Just Happen” because it is described as the record's coiled spring, tense and emotionally potent.
• The album's core strengths are its melancholic sampling, intimate production and a quietly simmering anger expressed with calm control.

Themes

Critic's Take

James Blake finds himself splintered and whole on Trying Times, each song a gleaming shard that together reveals his range and wit. The best tracks on Trying Times are the album’s emotional poles: “Death of Love” stands as the clear centerpiece, its Cohen sample turning Blake’s cynicism into something chillingly precise, while closing moments like “Through The High Wire” and “Just A Little Higher” ask the listener to look up and trust the light. Fechik’s writing leans into Blake’s dry humor and frank sincerity, making the case that these standout songs are where his identities cohere into genuine connection. The result is an album whose best songs reward repeated listening, offering little beacons in trying times.

Key Points

• The best song is "Death of Love" because its Leonard Cohen sample and blunt cynicism make it the album's emotional centerpiece.
• The album’s core strengths are Blake's ability to fuse dark and light, pairing dry humor with sincere moments that bridge isolation into connection.

Themes

Critic's Take

James Blake sounds more assured than ever on Trying Times, a record that wears its diversity as a strength rather than a liability. Cross writes in his characteristic measured, appreciative tone that the album "expertly showcases more sides to his artistry," and it is this variety that makes the best songs on Trying Times stand out. Chief among them is “Days Go By”, the declared standout track, which crystallises Blake's matured songwriting amid the album's jazz-tinged neo-soul and ethereal R&B moments. The reviewer's voice is steady and evaluative, pointing to a cohesive, if occasionally fatigued, second half that does little to diminish the highs of tracks like “Days Go By”.

Key Points

• The best song is “Days Go By” because the reviewer explicitly labels it the standout and ties it to the album's matured songwriting.
• The album's core strength is its confident diversity, showcasing multiple genres while remaining cohesive.

Themes

Critic's Take

In his quietly analytical voice, James Blake frames Trying Times around songs that feel like doctrines and small miracles. The review zeroes in on “Death of Love” as a survival directive and crowns “Make Something Up” the album’s philosophical centerpiece, while the churchy waltz of “I Had a Dream She Took My Hand” and the title track give the record a spiritual heft. Seip praises the production's duality - electronic experiment and gospel intimacy - and points to moments like “Didn’t Come To Argue” and “Through The High Wire” where Blake’s instincts most clearly coalesce. The narrative concludes that Trying Times may not be his most commanding album, but its clarity, honesty, and depth make these best tracks essential listening.

Key Points

• The best song, "Make Something Up," is the album's philosophical centerpiece combining jagged and sleek production with lyrical urgency.
• Trying Times' core strengths are its emotional clarity, blend of electronic experiment and gospel intimacy, and moments of genuine hope.

Themes

Critic's Take

James Blake leans into topical unease on Trying Times, but it is the music rather than the messaging that stays with you. Rachel Aroesti praises the album’s “strikingly fresh yet distantly familiar” hooks and points to songs like Days Go By and Rest Of Your Life as moments where samples and sudden stylistic shifts pay off. She notes that while the lyrics can be preachy, the inventive dissonance and bold production choices make these the best tracks to listen for. Overall, Aroesti argues the tunes are undoubtedly worth hearing.

Key Points

• “Days Go By” is the best track for its inventive repurposing of grime that gives the album a thrilling sample-driven anchor.
• The album’s core strength is its strikingly fresh hooks and bold, abrupt stylistic shifts that keep Blake’s sound inventive despite dubious lyrics.

Critic's Take

James Blake arrives at a new clarity on Trying Times, where the best songs - notably “Walk Out Music”, “Make Something Up” and “Rest Of Your Life” - balance existential dread with unabashed romanticism. Ryce writes with amused authority, noting Blake’s strange, warbly torch songs and how here they are tighter, more melodic and steeped in classic R&B. The reviewer praises the album’s moments of daring production alongside intimate songwriting, singling out “Rest Of Your Life” as the record’s summit. This is still Blake’s moony, occasionally weird world, but one that often lands its emotional punches with precision.

Key Points

• The best song, "Rest Of Your Life", pairs a buzzing house beat with heartfelt lyricism to become the album’s summit.
• Trying Times mixes classic R&B songwriting and bold production experiments to balance intimacy with sonic daring.

Critic's Take

James Blake approaches Trying Times like a confessional, and the best songs on the album are the ones that refuse consolation: “Make Something Up” lays bare a terrifying, specific ache, “Doesn't Just Happen” explodes with Dave's compact confessions, and the title piece “Trying Times” admits breaking with a blunt, small set of lines. The record's strongest tracks trade polish for exactitude, offering images that stick and questions that do the emotional work. If you search for the best tracks on Trying Times, start with those three, which anchor the album's frank, devastating center. The result is an album that feels brave, spare, and heartbreakingly particular rather than showy.

Key Points

• The best song is "Make Something Up" because it names suicidal compulsion with specific, brave language.
• The album’s strength is pared-down, candid writing that translates private fracture into vivid images.

Themes

Critic's Take

In his quiet, searching way Patrick Smith finds the best songs on Trying Times to be those that marry Blake's mournful heart to daring production. James Blake opens with “Walk Out Music”, a fist-raised, spectral opener that sets the emotional code, and “Doesn't Just Happen” emerges as the album's centrepiece, strings coiling as Blake and Dave strike off each other. He also singles out “Death of Love” and “I Had a Dream She Took My Hand” for their spacious sorrow and retro-soul interpolation, which together make them among the best tracks on Trying Times. The tone throughout is searching rather than triumphant, so the best songs are those that let grief and endurance breathe.

Key Points

• “Doesn't Just Happen” is the album's centrepiece because of its tense strings and striking collaboration with Dave.
• The album's core strength is its emotional logic: spacious arrangements that let grief and endurance breathe.

Themes