1000 Forms of Fear


 * "And I am what I am afraid of" — Melissa Etheridge

1000 Forms of Fear is the sixth studio album by Australian singer and songwriter Sia Furler, released under the mononym Sia. It was released globally to digital retailers on 4 July 2014.

Background
Following the mildly successful release of her fifth studio album, We Are Born, Sia decided to retire as a recording artist on the aftermath of a suicide attempt that she did not go through. Her comeback single, "Titanium", was released in 2011 on popular DJ David Guetta's second album, Nothing But The Beat, followed by another single: "She Wolf (Falling To Pieces)".

From 2011 to 2013, Sia spent her time writing songs for artists like Beyoncé, Britney Spears, Céline Dion, Flo Rida, Christina Aguilera and Rihanna, to name a few.

By September 2013, Sia had been taking time to make recording sessions in her home studio with the hope of releasing a full-length album by the next spring. Her conditions for the album were that she would not do any promotion or tours. RCA Records agreed to these conditions.

In an interview with NME in February of 2015, Sia revealed that her record was released as an unnegotionable contractual obligation:

In an interview with Elle, Sia explained that the album's title was entirely based on a quote by a friend who was going through the process of giving birth:

Composition
1000 Forms of Fear is primarily an electropop album, with some influences of hip-hop and reggae. It opens with the glossy electropop track, "Chandelier", which includes a reggae type beat. Lyrically, the track talks about "the glitter and fatigue of a party girl's life." , tackling the issues of alcoholism that Sia had to deal with before she was sober. The follow-up, "Big Girls Cry", was mildly compared to Alanis Morissette's track, "Hands Clean". On the third track, "Burn the Pages", Sia describes a friend who she wants to cheer up: "You're twisted up like a slipknot / Tied by a juicehead who just took his T-shot." "Eye of the Needle" is a "military-march" piano ballad, while "Hostage" is a new wave pop and ska track rejected from Sia's fifth album that features her voice "cracking like a punk singer." The sixth song, "Straight for the Knife", employs strings for its instrumentation and lyrically details a tempestuous relationship: "But will someone find me swinging from the rafters / I’m hanging on your every word."

"Fair Game", where Sia sings "Watch me squirm baby, but you're just what I need," is a minimalist and string-laden song about the desire to find an equal partner. The solo version of "Elastic Heart", which originally featured The Weeknd and Diplo on The Hunger Games: Catching Fire soundtrack, is a tremendously impacting trap song. The song addresses "the overwhelming strength [Sia] needed to convince herself that life was worth living after coming out of a crushing relationship." "Free the Animal" lyrically "imagines being killed in lurid, masochistic detail" with the lyrics "Detonate me / Shoot me like a cannon ball / Granulate me / Kill me like an animal." The tenth song, "Fire Meet Gasoline", was compared to Beyoncé's track "Halo" by Harriet Gibsone from The Guardian. "Cellophane" is an electropop track, where Sia likens herself to "a basket filled with pain." 1000 Forms of Fear concludes with "Dressed in Black", which Heather Phares of AllMusic described as a ballad "with more depth than the ones she writes for hire."

Singles

 * "Chandelier" served as the record's lead promotional single.  It was released to digital retailers onto the iTunes Stores on March 17, 2014. The music video for the track was released on May 6, 2014; it features former Dance Moms dancer Maddie Ziegler in a blonde wig. The single gained massive commercial success, peaking at number eight on the US Billboard Hot 100, becoming the first single by Sia as a lead artist to appear on the chart.  "Chandelier" also peaked within the top five of record charts in Europe and Oceania countries, including: Flanders and France (number one), Australia and Norway (number two), New Zealand (number three), United Kingdom (number six), and Slovakia (number five).  The track was certified triple platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association and gold by Recorded Music NZ.


 * "Eye of the Needle" was released digitally on June 3, 2014 as a promotional single, while "Big Girls Cry" was made available for download on June 25. "Elastic Heart" was released as the fourth single from 1000 Forms of Fear in January 2015. A music video for the song was released on 7 January 2015 and features Ziegler and actor Shia LaBeouf.  "Elastic Heart" peaked at number 17 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and charted within the top five charts of several countries, including Australia and Ireland.  On April 2, 2015, the music video for "Big Girls Cry" was released. "Fire Meet Gasoline" was officially released as a single in Germany on June 19, 2015.

Critical reception
1000 Forms of Fear received mostly positive reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received the average score of 76, which indicates "generally favorable reviews", based on 28 reviews. The Boston Globe critic Sarah Rodman described the release as "dynamite," while Heather Phares from AllMusic called the album "the sound of [Sia] owning her success." Writing for The Daily Telegraph, Helen Brown praised the album's high production and "inspirational" lyrics showcasing Furler struggling to deal with sensitive topics such as drug addiction and bipolar disorder. Rolling Stone 's Julianne Escobedo Shepherd simply wrote that "she sounds like a superstar," while Maura Johnston of Spin characterised 1000 Forms of Fear as "a chunk of the human emotional spectrum committed to record." On behalf of The New York Times, Jon Pareles lauded the "loopy, unresolved passions" on the album in favour of "the triumphal, laminated, computer-perfected tone of Sia’s clients."

Writing for Slant Magazine, Annie Galvin opined that 1000 Forms of Fear "should be the vessel that rockets the singer out of relative obscurity and into the stratosphere populated by those more recognizable stars who've come to dominate the pop-music universe thanks, in part, to her songwriting skills." Mikael Wood writing for the Los Angeles Times praised Sia's vocals and the production by Greg Kurstin. Likewise, Entertainment Weekly 's Adam Markovitz positively viewed Sia's voice as "astonishing," giving the album a B score.

In a less enthusiastic review, The Guardian Harriet Gibsone shared that the album was so impeccable and "contemporary-sounding" that "its impact may fade with time." The A.V. Club writer Annie Zaleski wrote: "1000 Forms of Fear certainly has the songs and contemporary sheen to make Sia a star in her own right, but it's at the expense of both her emotional intimacy and her offbeat personality."

Accolades
Sarah Rodman of The Boston Globe labelled 1000 Forms of Fear the "Best Surprise" of 2014. It ranked number 13 on Digital Spy's list of Top 15 Albums of 2014. Jon Pareles from The New York Times placed the album at number 5 on his list of favourite albums of the year. It also appeared on the lists of the best albums of 2014 of Slant Magazine (number 13 ) and The Daily Telegraph (number 44 ). Rolling Stone ranked it number 20 on its list of 20 Best Pop Albums of 2014. At the ARIA Music Awards of 2014, Sia won Album of the Year, Best Female Artist and Best Pop Release for 1000 Forms of Fear. Lead single "Chandelier" received four Grammy nominations for Song of the Year, Record of the Year, Best Pop Solo Performance and Best Music Video at the 57th Grammy Awards.

Charts
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