a few days spun..
listening to The Arcade Fire album, Funeral.
Now I have time to pay attention to lyrics. There's a general consensus written about this band: first of all that you can hear within them upwards of thirty of your favorite bands. There's something for everyone.
But think of it this way. This is their first real album. Their first. They are coming out the gate this fully formed in intention and style and purpose and their album tells a story.
That's the declarative thread upon which the rock writer seizes - the album is informed by the grief of so many members of the band going through a period when loved ones passed away. This is the journalistic hook; yes, but everyone else is quick to comment on the emotional force of the band. And curiously there's a lot of invocation of "honest emotion". Well what's lacking in the rest of indie music today that "honest emotion" is such a surprise?
Like, for instance, in all honesty - is there a whit, a jot of even a single sound on the new Interpol album that enters the core of your being and hits you like a good sharp kiss or scream? I'm not asking whether it rocks or if the arrangements are good. I'm asking if there's anything there that moves you. They dress right, they sound right, they reference right, they even write songs right. But no one will be musing playing a song off that album at their wedding or on their deathbed, the fanastical extreme scenarios all music lovers must tease themselves with late at night alone.
It's as simple as two lines in Une anee sans lumiere, the third track on the album.
"hey! The street lights all burnt out...
"...hey! My eyes are shooting sparks"
The street lights have gone out. Your loved ones are becoming more and more seperate from you - age or distance the culprit, take your pick. You are starting to realize, nearing thirty, that life is hard in a subtle way. You're going to have to say goodbye to all the good stuff, all the childhood and adolescence that went with it. You will even have to abandon some dreams. But not all of it. There's still beauty in a snowstorm, in a power outage, in a realization of mortality. There's feet stomping and hand clapping and singing in unison. I believe this is why every song this band delivers, no matter how informed by that story, the handle the writers will hold onto about death and emigration, ends on a note of elation.
This album is stumbling into a dark cold room on one of those winter days where the sun set too early, too early perhaps for you to ever notice it... And there's a blanket that's a comfort, or someone to lie down next to. It's a joke at the darkest moment, a grim recognition of absurdity. It's honest emotion, because it's not afraid to show bleakness, despair... But in a triumph for pop music it complicates the emotion, and says that oh dear god there's still the opposite of that, too, and they coexist in the same moments. If anything, the funeral is a wake. This is the ultimate liberation of this band, and why everyone keeps denoting it is full of "honest emotion". It makes you feel but doesn't lie to you. It is not one track, it is not a pose, it is not a philosophy carried in the way in they dress. It's a cruel word and a banishment, and plea and a prayer all at once.
Yes, my favorite album of the year.
Now I have time to pay attention to lyrics. There's a general consensus written about this band: first of all that you can hear within them upwards of thirty of your favorite bands. There's something for everyone.
But think of it this way. This is their first real album. Their first. They are coming out the gate this fully formed in intention and style and purpose and their album tells a story.
That's the declarative thread upon which the rock writer seizes - the album is informed by the grief of so many members of the band going through a period when loved ones passed away. This is the journalistic hook; yes, but everyone else is quick to comment on the emotional force of the band. And curiously there's a lot of invocation of "honest emotion". Well what's lacking in the rest of indie music today that "honest emotion" is such a surprise?
Like, for instance, in all honesty - is there a whit, a jot of even a single sound on the new Interpol album that enters the core of your being and hits you like a good sharp kiss or scream? I'm not asking whether it rocks or if the arrangements are good. I'm asking if there's anything there that moves you. They dress right, they sound right, they reference right, they even write songs right. But no one will be musing playing a song off that album at their wedding or on their deathbed, the fanastical extreme scenarios all music lovers must tease themselves with late at night alone.
It's as simple as two lines in Une anee sans lumiere, the third track on the album.
"hey! The street lights all burnt out...
"...hey! My eyes are shooting sparks"
The street lights have gone out. Your loved ones are becoming more and more seperate from you - age or distance the culprit, take your pick. You are starting to realize, nearing thirty, that life is hard in a subtle way. You're going to have to say goodbye to all the good stuff, all the childhood and adolescence that went with it. You will even have to abandon some dreams. But not all of it. There's still beauty in a snowstorm, in a power outage, in a realization of mortality. There's feet stomping and hand clapping and singing in unison. I believe this is why every song this band delivers, no matter how informed by that story, the handle the writers will hold onto about death and emigration, ends on a note of elation.
This album is stumbling into a dark cold room on one of those winter days where the sun set too early, too early perhaps for you to ever notice it... And there's a blanket that's a comfort, or someone to lie down next to. It's a joke at the darkest moment, a grim recognition of absurdity. It's honest emotion, because it's not afraid to show bleakness, despair... But in a triumph for pop music it complicates the emotion, and says that oh dear god there's still the opposite of that, too, and they coexist in the same moments. If anything, the funeral is a wake. This is the ultimate liberation of this band, and why everyone keeps denoting it is full of "honest emotion". It makes you feel but doesn't lie to you. It is not one track, it is not a pose, it is not a philosophy carried in the way in they dress. It's a cruel word and a banishment, and plea and a prayer all at once.
Yes, my favorite album of the year.
2 Comments:
It's me again!
I agree with you about the album, I recently checked it out because a friend suggested I do so. Needless to say, I instantly loved it.
As far as the new Interpol, I also agree. There is nothing emotionally moving in that album. I would have to say that their first album was much better, and it will be hard to reach that same calibur. The second album seems much more mainstream, which kind of dissapointed me. I was hoping that they would evolve from the first album, but I wouldn't say that the second album was an evolution from the first. I think they could have done much better. But, all in all...it's a fun album. Definitely party worthy. I still prefer the first.
I don't even regard the first Interpol album as emotionally moving. I think it has some great arrangements on it. It's perfect driving music when you want something that rocks but you don't want to be invovled, if you catch my drift. Stylish wallpaper. I am just amazed that the are with Modest Mouse probably the largest ambassador for indie rock to the wider mainstream world; and the picture painted is of inaccessible New York avant garde chic. As opposed to what draws me to that music - really good songwriting, sonic experimentation, and honest emotion.
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