Adele Delivers With Emotionally Poignant ’25’

Stephanie Hernandez

It has been four long years since the reigning queen of regret and sorrow, Adele Adkins, has released any new material for the world to hear. Her critically acclaimed records “19” and “21” were followed by major success on a global scale, officially cementing Adele’s status as pop’s golden icon. A breath of fresh air to an industry criticized for creating unrealistic views on love perpetuated by even more contrived sugar coated characters, Adele has never tried to portray anything other than who she is,  and we all thank her for that. Putting words and octaves to raw emotions most of us try to suppress, this songstress stands tall, allowing her pain to reverberate through her fans’ speakers and linger in their souls just a while longer. The anticipation for her latest album, “25,” in the wake of an almost unbearable wait has proven the public’s thirst for catharsis is all the more powerful than their desire for a catchy dance beat, and Adele is happy to oblige.

A powerhouse of acute emotional maturity and fervent soulful melodies, Adele has created an eleven-song journey to an existential longing we all know, even if not experienced at such intensity in our own lives. Utterly absorbing, the album reads like an ardently written letter to loved ones lost; expressing a lifetime of regret and weariness in just over an hour. “25” sticks close to the formula that made her last record, “21,” so beautiful: piano led ballads accented with bouts of symphonic strings and brass all culminating into a swell of well-penned heartbreak. Adele’s titanic voice hits you hard on “25’s” opening track, the already worldwide hit single, “Hello.” A song so poignant it has the power to make listeners miss people they haven’t even met. The track’s grandeur and power ballad construction sets the stage for even more exploration into the mournful longing introduced within the first few bars of “Hello.”

The record continues on with the Martin and Shellback produced “Send My Love (To Your New Lover),” quite possibly the most spry we get on this album. The track manages to keep in line with Adele’s tasteful and controlled sound while also providing a moment of cheerful tongue-in-cheek play.  From here on out the liner notes reveal some pretty impressive talent behind Adele’s comeback album including Greg Kurstin, Ryan Tedder, Danger Mouse and Adele’s longtime friend and collaborator Paul Epworth. But do not confuse this for a producer dominated record, it is apparent that those behind the chair stayed there, simply serving as devil’s advocates and helping push the singer ever so slightly out of her comfort zone. Speaking of Epworth, the nouveau R&B styled track “I Miss You” is a prime example of how Adele can take what she knows and mix it up just enough to satisfy her own artistic integrity all while making way for new elements like rhythmic beats and eerily swirled backing vocals. “When We Were Young” provides all the misty eyed sorrow you could ever dream of while the finger picked acoustic guitar of “Million Years Ago” serves up a gentle melody, caressing you deeper into Adele’s timeworn heart. The tempo is stepped up by the organ led and Danger Mouse driven “River Lea,” the closest we get to a 2015 “Rolling in the Deep,” the track’s gospel inspired mood echoes beautifully within the realm of the remainder of the record. “All I Ask,” with the light handed touch of Bruno Mars, strips back instrumentation and gives a lightly piano laden plane to appreciate Adele’s gusting voice for another few moments swathed in an endless echo of octave bursting song. Gaining points for her atmospheric “Water Under the Bridge,” Adele continues to inspire passion through to the bitter end with the uplifting “Sweetest Devotion.” Cavernous and echoing with love and loss, “25” hits hard.

As a whole, “25” is a stately reminder that Adele still has the ability to reel us into her perennially melancholic world. This love wracked English songstress laments over vanished time with exquisitely stripped down arrangements, letting the listener fill in the rest with their own pain and memories. From booming choruses to goose bump inducing falsettos, her soul revivalism finds itself seeping into every dark corner of your mind and lingering there for hours on end. “25’s” best moments come when Adele is pushed, whether by others or by her own sense of dutiful perfection. The outcome is a record that can stand on its own without relying on the laurels of former glories, but it instead creates new reasons to fall in love with love and to come to terms with the pain that can result in something as beautiful as this.

Adele’s “25” is available on Apple iTunes now.