Working through the five stages of grief - denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance - can be an exhausting, traumatic and frustrating process, but on her second album, 21, Grammy-award winning songstress Adele forgoes the psychiatrist's leather couch in favor of singing through her heartbreak. Her feelings are messy, and one cannot help but sympathize for the girl as she treks towards acceptance by the record's end, but what a gloriously bittersweet ride it is.
Adele's emotional turmoil is apparent from the start with "Rolling In The Deep," the album's first single. With its intricate layering of pulsating percussion, handclaps and a chorus that finds the singer desperately wailing, "We could have had it all," it sounds like nothing else out there, but the melody is so hook-laden it seems tailor-made for radio. Kiss-off track "Rumour Has It" follows a similar formula but not without a few tricks thrown in for good measure. For a moment, the singer presents herself as the confident single gal, heartbreak be gone.
The listener soon realizes it's all just a front. Anger, bargaining and depression rear their ugly heads before long, and it's a testament to the music's strength that the listener feels guilty for enjoying the byproducts of the singer's suffering. "Turning Tables" and "Don't You Remember" find our heroine playing defense, admitting her faults - "I know I have a fickle heart, and bitterness" - all for the sake of keeping her lover from running away. "Set Fire to the Rain" is a tour de force of anger with a sweeping orchestral accompaniment, and the singer's soulful, powerful voice
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