On November 3, 2016, pop singer-songwriter Sam Smith released his second full studio album, The Thrill of It All. The regular version of the album has 10 tracks and the special addition has 14 tracks. This album was long-awaited by fans of Smith since the last music Smith had released was in 2015. His last full album, In The Lonely Hour, peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard charts, but his new album is currently at the No. 1 on the Billboard album chart as of November 12, 2017.
Fans were teased with Smith releasing “Too Good At Goodbyes” as a single before the album came out, which gave a glimpse of what the album would sound like. Every song definitely had some similarity in sound to “Too Good At Goodbyes” and I think that song was the best song to have as the first single.
As a fan of Smith’s previous music, I was excited to listen to his new album to see if it was similar to his other ones. Fortunately, it has a familiar sound to his album In the Lonely Hour, which was released in 2014. The album is filled with emotional piano ballads such as “Burning” and emotional gospel ballads like “HIM,” in which Smith sings in the perspective of a homosexual boy who struggles with his religion and his sexual orientation.
Smith uses a lot of R&B beats and sounds to bring his songs to life, along with primary instruments like piano and guitar. In “Pray,” Smith sings about not knowing what to do when the world seems to be falling apart right in front of you.
In one of my favorite songs off of the album, “Scars,” Smith sings about how his mother and father’s relationship and decisions have affected his life.
The album contains mostly sad songs, but has enough variety of different rhythms and breaks from dreariness to not drag. Smith did a great job of creating fresh lyrics and sounds out of old, similar themes used in his previous songs. His voice is full of emotion and once he goes into his falsetto, it hits you right in the soul.
The album overall is very honest and pure, with calming melodies and complex, real lyrics that really make you think about the world we live in today.
