A lot of quantity this week, although I'm less certain on the quality.
The Walkmen - Heaven
For quite a while, the Walkmen had one song I liked - the truly enjoyable "The Rat" from 2004's album Bows + Arrows - and a lot of stuff I had zero interest in. Then in 2010 they released Lisbon, which was a big departure for the band. Whereas once the band was overbearingly jittery, Lisbon had a mellow minimalism, which made the entire album a much more listenable affair, even if it was a little too low energy for my tastes. In other words, it was a bit of a hangover album, but a little too much so. Their new album Heaven manages to split the difference between the band's earlier work and their last album quite nicely: it's still passes by easy enough, but there's a little more rock inserted into it than their last album. This results in quite a few songs I would consider catchy, particularly the jangly title track. I could see this album growing on me a bit.
Selections
Heaven
Nightingales
Heartbreaker
Scissor Sisters - Magic Hour
I'm not sure that the Scissor Sisters really hold up for an entire album, but when they're catchy, they are very, very catchy, and this album is no exception. I am less enthusiastic about the hip hop numbers, but the one serious ballad ("Year of Living Dangerously") works well enough. There's even a little soul (Hall & Oates soul, but soul nonetheless) in the albums's best song "Baby Come Home." This album is more or less completely what I expected from this group, which is perfectly fine with me.
Selections
Baby Come Home
Only the Horses
Year of Living Dangerously
Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros - Here
Edward Sharpe is never going to have authenticity, but fortunately such a concern isn't particularly important to me. Here (just like the album title, get it?) he's plumbing a lot of 60's and 70's soft rock, and the album has its catchy moments. One thing that sticks out to me though is how shitty the production on this thing is. I'm guessing this isn't driven by financial limitations - I have heard their song "Home" on enough commercials that the band had to have made a pretty penny - so I'm mostly just baffled by the decision. Also, the chick singer is much more prominent here, likely due to the success she had on that aforementioned commercial soundtrack single "Home". She's got a decent voice, I guess, although the production obscures it a bit.
Selections
Man on Fire
Fiya Wata
That's What's Up
Saint Etienne - Words and Music by Saint Etienne
This band has been around since 1990, and their dance-pop definitely sounds more like the dance music from that era than a lot of what's on the radio now. I think this suffers a little too much from track-sameness - just about every song makes me go "Oh, that is mildly beautiful and reasonably catchy" - but the music does do a good job of combining chilly ambiance with catchy dance choruses.
Selections
Tonight
I've Got Your Music
DJ
Sigur Ros - Valtari
Did I just say Saint Etienne had chilly ambiance? Because they have nothing on Sigur Ros. I don't even really know how to review this stuff: it's all in Icelandic, and it seems like music that would be really good to do something else to. Oh, and most of the songs are over six minutes long. I think this is hauntingly beautiful, but it may just as easily be dreadfully boring. It's kinda like shoegaze without the reverb, I guess, all slow build and crescendo. I at least think the song Varuo (or something similar, Icelandic uses a fucked-up alphabet) is a keeper.
Selections
Ekki Muk
Varuo
Eg Anda
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