| |
|
So the list of music that I need to get this month is huge, and my coffers are shallow, but it was payday yesterday meaning I needed to pick up something. I was very tempted by Dizzee Rascal and the Gossip, but though they're very definitely on the list, they're not what I'm in the mood for right now, and I came very close to deciding to wait for the Outkast and Neptunes releases still to come... and then I saw Electric Version selling on the cheap somewhere. It was only right to buy it - it is, after all, allegedly the record that started a movement (joycore, obviously).
And it's really good. Joycore is the word. It seems like ages since I heard an album of this sort of music that I could actually listen to and enjoy pretty much all the way through (I know it's heresy to some, but I find the Flaming Lips only quite good, not godlike). So many bands try to make power pop which is sunny and breezy (and other adjectives to do with weather), and the music press tells you it's great and it sounds like the Beach Boys and Abbey Road-era Beatles, and when you finally hear it it's just so uninspiring and lazy and fucking dull. This album is not like that. This album is a whole bundle of music-critic cliches being renewed and made true, for once. It's a joyous explosion of harmonies - see?
I think my three immediate favourites are 'Loose Translation', 'It's Only Divine Right' and 'The Laws Have Changed', with the title track lagging in fourth place. All three of those songs have the kind of vocal or guitar hooks that stick in your head so quickly you almost feel as if you've known them for years. I completely agree with what has been said about the classic status of 'The Laws Have Changed'. It puts a spring in my step. I wish I could remember who this song reminded me of, Neko Case singing "all hail" seems really reminiscent of another band, one whom I haven't listened to in ages - but I have no idea who, or if this is just my imagination.
Oh, and in answer to todd: how I feel about that repeated "the bells ring no no no" bit depends on my mood, but it's definitely the first point on the album I felt like skipping to the next track. Although I did like Destroyer's 'The Bad Arts', Dan Bejar's songs are probably my least favourite on the album at the moment, but that may change. I do quite like the fact that his vocals really suit his 'secret member', no-sleeve-photo role though. And I suppose I like 'Chump Change' a fair bit, it's just - I think I have to be in a predisposed mood to like Bejar's stuff, y'know? Whereas something like 'The Laws...' is just going to put you in that mood conveyed by the song every time, I reckon. |
|
|
