Glassworks, composed by Philip Glass, is consistently good, but it’s bothersome how obviously formulaic it is. As everyone’s probably told you already, each track is deliberately dizzying and repetitive. It’s pleasant and effective, so that isn’t a bad thing. Each of its songs can really dig into your skull. However, it loses effectiveness after you notice it’s being done for the third, fourth, fifth, sixth time in a row.

Other than the individual compositions following the same formula, the album lacks cohesion. The tracks don’t segue into one another which snaps you out of your trance when each one finishes. This lets you notice another flaw: it’s also a tad monotone. You’ve got the slow, eerie, unsettling movements and the fast, frantic and fun movements. Neither break character until you move on to the next track which is usually the opposite tone.

I still can’t award Glassworks less than a 4/5, though. It was too much fun and its 40-minute runtime is easily digestible, offsetting the album’s repetitiveness a lot. Glassworks kept me entertained just enough without becoming monotonous. A one-trick pony, but that that pony takes you on a short, fun trip through a rotating kaleidoscope.