The Bloom’s Off Michelle Branch

Arion Berger of The Washington Post reviewed Michelle Branch’s sophomore effort ‘Hotel Paper’. Berger remarked, “If ‘Hotel Paper’ is any indication of Branch’s maturity, she is a purveyor of fusty easy-listening in young-girl drag. The songs are solid, her voice is perfectly fine — if amazingly youthful for the dowdy tunes — and the album is a competent bore with no X-factor to tip the music into the estrogen-fueled earnestness of Lilith Fair folk or the glossy faux-punk of her main competitor, Avril Lavigne. The album’s most serious flaw is its me-me-me focus; Branch consistently presents herself as yearning for romance while keeping her standards high, but there’s so little personality in the singing that after a dozen declarations that she’s ready for real love we begin to wonder what she has to offer.”