release date: Jun. 18, 2007
format: 2 cd
[album rate: 3 / 5] [2,77]
producer: Steve Cooney; RonTom
label: Ministry Of Sound - nationality: Ireland
Track highlights: Disc 1 'Dublin Sessions', 1. "Something Beautiful" - 3. "Out of the Depths" - 4. "Dark I Am Yet Lovely"
Disc 2, 'London Sessions', 1. "Something Beautiful" - 3. "Out of the Depths" - 4. "33" - 7. "If You Had a Vineyard" - 8. "The Glory of Jah"
8th studio album by Sinéad O'Connor following nearly two years after the reggae-tribute album Throw Down Your Arms
(Oct. 2005). The album is a 2-disc cd release with the first disc titled "Dublin Sessions". This is produced by Steve Cooney and co-produced by Graham Bolger and Sinéad O'Connor. Disc 2 is titled "London Sessions" and is produced by RonTom [aka Ronald Tomlinson]. The unusual thing about the 2-disc album format is that both discs almost comes with identical tracklistings. That is, the track order is slightly changed and only two songs are unique, one on each disc, with the major differences being that the "Dublin Sessions" are acoustically arranged songs and the "London Sessions" are more traditionally arranged as soft pop / rock songs. The album is quite lengthy with 90 minutes total running time, and then it basically comes without any memorable songs. It's not so much that the songs are all religious hymns - as I do fancy Van Morrison even when he is most explicitly touching on religion because his music usually is founded on great songs and catchy arrangements, however, this is simply not the case with Theology, which easily comes out as O'Connor's least favourable album to date. If you say plan on adding a release by O'Connor to your music collection, this is simply not where you should look. It should read avoid! Except if you're into say Christian pop / rock music and you're actually in search of soft pop / rock religious hymns. "But you point to track highlights of the album!", you may argue. Agreed, but they're not great. Not any of them, only better compared to the other songs on the album. Perhaps it's actually mediocre and should be granted 2,5 / 5 but I just like O'Connor's singing qualities, and they're still here, somewhere.
Not recommended.
[ allmusic.com 3,5 / 5, 👍Uncut, PopMatters, Slant 3 / 5, 🤯Rolling Stone 1 / 5, Spin 2 / 5 stars ]
