Oxford Collapse collapses

Too bad really. That album that we reviewed gets better and better with each spin. (Yes, I still say "spin" even though it doesn't actually spin on a turntable or a CD player.) Thoughts on the Collapse?

You and Me - The Walkmen

I least have to give the Delgadoes credit. I listened intently to them, trying to figure out if I loved them or hated them. And with Oxford Collapse, the first listen may not have done it for me, but I had that feeling that continued listens would be worthwhile. All this is a nice introduction for my feelings about You and Me by the Walkmen. After about the fifth listen, I realized that the marginal utility for each subsequent listen would be nil. Not only was I getting nothing out of it, it was preventing me from exploring other, more interesting music. So, I stopped listening to it. I can't even comment on individual tracks because they all sounded the same. What did they sound like? They sounded like a NYC band trying to be arty at different tempos. I'm sure there are editors of hipster magazines that are working themselves into a lather describing the detached vocals or the guitars that just rip right through each song. Yawn. Blah. So orchestrated arty, but without any redeeming quality.

The intangible with this album is simple. Would I rather listen to anything else? If it was Jack Johnson, I would rather listen to the Walkmen's You and Me. Other than that, I think I'd try the other band.

Final Rating: D.

Okkervil River - The Stand Ins

Here's the thesis for my review: After listening to this album for, oh, five minutes, it was already better than the previous two we chose. I think that means I need to downgrade Oxford Collapse a half-step. Then again, the first real song of the album is Lost Coastlines which might be the best thing Okkervil River has ever done and considering how I consider Okkervil River to one of the premier indie bands of our time, that's saying something. Everything about the song is great...the melody, the bassline, the banjo, the Meiburg singing parts, everything. It really sets such a high bar that the rest of the album can't match. Too bad. I do think the rest of the album's pretty good, but I just can't stop listening to Lost Coastlines. I know, it's a completely unfair review. There are a couple of other tracks that I do really like namely Starry Stairs and the Ex-Girlfriend one. I'm just having ahard time listening to the rest of the album without a nagging voice in my head urging me to flip back to Lost Coastlines.

Intanglible for this album: Does it make me wanna be a rock star? The answer to that is a resounding, "Yes." From the moment I heard Lost Coastlines, I wanted to form a band and play a church talent show or something. Seriously.

Final Grade: I'm giving it an A-. I really should give it an I for incomplete because I haven't given the other songs their proper due. but from the couple of times I have heard the other songs, they are pretty good, so I think a prelim A- is fine, with an open reservation to the A area. That's right. It might become an A album for me. (I hope I'm not guilty of grade inflation. The more of these we do, the more likely I am to realize how I keep overrating albums.)

Hate Revisited

I can't stand this cd.

Nice review. I think you sum it up by saying something just seems off. I think a lot of the effort was lost on me. I feel like everything The Delgados were trying to do on Hate was pulled off successfully by Belle and Sebastian. And I'm not even a B+S fan but that's what it seems to me.

Worst comparison ever

I'm going to say that your "Guns 'N Roses meets the Carpenters" description is the most misleading, inaccurate description of a band...of all time. Hilarious.

Hate - The Delgados

Could I have been more excited to listen to this album after you had to go and say, "Dude, you're going to freaking love this album!" after you listened to the initial 13 seconds? I was completely unprepared for what followed. The only way I can truly describe the sound of this album is a musical hybrid of the Flaming Lips and Mercury Rev with singers that sing on-key and don't whine. Actually, the female vocalist sounds like...I dunno, a cross between Dubstar's lead singer or the female vocalist of Stars or something like that. The guy sounds generic. He's just kinda there. So, the initial challenge that this album presented is the age old question about copycat bands...if it sounds just like a band you like, should you detest them or should you embrace them? I usually dislike sound alike bands if they sound like a band I really really like, especially if it seems really obvious that they are imitating. So, I'm okay with the Editors and Interpol sounding exactly the same, but, I was not okay with I Can Make a Mess Like Nobody's Business sounding exactly like Dashboard Confessional (because I'm a sensitive girl, I guess). The most heinous of all imitators is, of course, Camouflage and the Great Commandment. I would guess 95% of the human race thinks that The Great Commandment was written and performed by Depeche Mode. I bet DM could play it at their concerts and everyone would say, "Oh yeah! What album is this off again?" Anyway, I kept thinking to myself, "Should I like this because they have better voices than FL or MR?" Every time I got passed it, I would relisten to the album and it would come flooding back. So, I sat there and struggled with it before it finally really got to me. The difference between the Flaming Lips (who I'm ok with) and Mercury Rev (who I really like), and the Delgados seems to reside in the ol' sincercity basket. FL and MR are sincere. The Delgados do not seem sincere. If Jonathan Donahue was singing All You Need is Hate or the Light Before We Land (the two tracks most like Mercury Rev), I would be putting them on a mix CD. And the bad part for the Delgados is that those are the two best tracks (except for the horribly named Child Killers which lyrics have nothing to do with the title). Pretty much this is my review. Not very technical, I can't really put my finger on it, but there's something about it that strikes me as off. Trying too hard to be critically acclaimed. I think that's it. There's nice stuff here. Maybe if I listen more, I'll appreciate the juxtoposition of baroque music and utterly depressing lyrics. But right now, the depressing lyrics just seem to be depressing to try and be cool. And that sucks.

Pulling a Camouflage, I'm ripping off your concept of intangibles, because it hit me as I was walking home today from work. As of now, would I put any one of the songs off this album on a mix CD? And the answer is, "No." Maybe I might send All You Need is Hate to someone as a joke. But, I can't see it making the cut against 20 other songs I might choose.

Overall grade: C- (that seems so low, but it just doesn't register. So, yes, a C-).

The Delgados: Hate

Even though I try not to, I always end up comparing the music I hear from new bands I find to two other bands whose music I’m familiar with. For example, I always end up saying, “They’re like a cross between Band X and Band Y.” I hate that I do it but that doesn’t stop me from doing it every time without fail. To help you understand just how fallible this method is you have to understand that I am by no conceivable means a music scholar. I’m very much a generalist. I see myself and knowing a little bit about a lot of bands; I don’t know everything about every band. Most of the time, I’m not able to put a song I hear from any given band into the context of their career. It’s like I hear a song and that song represents that band in my mind. I know that’s not fair whatsoever but I don’t have time to go back and do a thorough study of the band. So as I got into this album and listened to it more and more the thought that kept coming to my mind was: “This music is like a cross between The Carpenters and Guns N’ Roses.” (Mind you, I wouldn’t be considered a fan of either of those bands [I don’t own an album of either of theirs] so take my statement how you will.)

Tone: The tone of this album is, what I call, the Triple S: shiny, slick and smooth. It’s pretty much everything that I don’t like to see in an album, but that’s fine. I personally prefer some bite to my albums; some banter between band and engineer in the background; some sounds of instruments being shuffled around on the studio floor; footsteps; breathing; coughing; band members cursing under their breath at missing some note; some lo-fi goodness. However, I respect there are bands out there that ride the Triple S wave.

Voice: I think the voices on this album are great. I like there’s a man and a woman and they share the singing duties. And I like the woman’s voice! I wouldn’t run out and get her autograph if I saw her walking down the street but that’s okay. They do have a way of sounding super conceited but what UK band doesn’t so I guess it’s a moot point.

Music: The music is pretty good. I know that sound super lame but there wasn’t much that stood out for me on this one. I’ve got to be honest here. I would never have listened to this album all the way through once—let alone six or seven times—if it hadn’t been for this review thing we’ve got going on. It’s just not my cup of tea. However, I firmly believe that just because I don’t like a particular album that doesn’t mean it isn’t music that is well written and well performed. “Child Killers” is kind of a sweet lullaby (it totally sounds like Obi!); it’s connected in my mind to “All Rise.” There are several spots on this album where the drummer really steals the show—or is the show. I like that. Drums are cool. Although very good advice, the song “Never Look at the Sun” is boring. “Coming In From the Cold” is really the best song on the album. It’s the kind of song you want to take home and share a meal with. There are times when—in the music—I feel the stormy Scottish coastal weather on my face—which is pretty amazing since I’ve never been to Scotland. There are times I feel a sense of their national history. (Never Look At the Sun.) There are times—“Woke From Dreaming”—when the music makes me visualize a black grand piano rising out of the center of a huge concert hall stage lit by thousands of battery-powered candles, surrounded by a full orchestra, and Slash is standing on the piano madly torquing his guitar and Axl is sitting on the piano bench, hunched over the keys, long mess of red hair flipping so awesomely about his head and shoulders (obviously this image is before he went to corn rows). That’s right, “Woke From Dreaming” is the song that makes me most feel this album is a mix of The Carpenters and Guns N’ Roses (although it’s not the only song that makes me feel that way). I think it’s probably a mix of the fact G N’ R were (is, maybe?) so dramatic—like The Delgados—and the fact that Axl seemed to wear a lot of plaid back in the day. (Is there a Scottish “kind” of plaid?) Anyway, it just reminds me of the live video for “November Rain.” Just a word concerning songs that have foreign languages in them i.e. “Woke From Dreaming.” If the entire song in is a foreign language, it’s cool. If you start off in English and then have parts of the song in a foreign language, it pretentious. And if you have back-up singers chanting in a foreign language like medieval christian nymphs, it’s pretty much just weird.

Lyrics. Nothing interesting to report. Except any irony or whatever must be lost on me because I can’t really stand “All You Need is Hate.”

The Intangibles for this week:

• How does the album make me feel? Bored—except for “Coming In From the Cold” which is awesome.
• How does this album compare to fellow Scots Camera Obscura’s Biggest Bluest Hi-Fi? Not. Even. Close. We’re talking Northern and Southern Hemisphere here.
• Had my friend’s wife who is really into bands like this (foreign, women singers, ride the Triple S wave, etc.) heard about The Delgados? No.
• Did listening to this album make you appreciate Oxford Collapse’s Bits from last week more than I initially did? Very, very much so.
• How do you envision The Delgados spending their Sunday mornings off? Playing Phase 10 and getting really serious about playing by the rules.
• What song off this cd would I play if I was giving Britt Daniel a ride to Six Flags? It has to be “Woke From Dreaming.” “Dude, you gotta hear how much this song sounds like a mix between The Carpenters and Guns N’ Roses! Oh, and, Britt, are you, uh, going to pay for parking or what?”

Grades:
Tone: 1/5
Voices: 2/5
Music: 2/5 (Mostly because of “Coming In From the Cold.”)
Lyrics: 1/5
Intangibles: 2/5

Total: 8/25