So 2009 has been an amazing year for music, really really strong in my opinion, littered with brilliant releases throughout it’s 12 months. Me and Lewi set about deciding upon and writing about our Top Ten favourite albums released this year and god it was hard. After a bit of deliberating we eventually settled on those below. Check ‘em out.

10. DOOM – Born Like This

DOOM is notorious for; his alias’s, his fake shows, and his incredible MCing. He has an almost cult like following, and has the respect of every head in the hip hop industry. It’s been awhile since he has resurfaced, and with time, comes great expectation. “Born Like This”, is a little different too DOOM’s old albums, there aren’t as much cartoon references, and it is far darker than his old stuff. The album does seem more produced, but it doesn’t loose its raw feel. Although it is not one of DOOM’s best albums, its still one of the best albums of the year, combining super heroes, media, injustice, violence, and DOOM’s magic touch.
Listen to “Yessir”:

9. The Horrors – Primary Colours

I wasn’t a big fan of The Horrors first time around with their cartoonlike, almost archetypal gothic appearance and nonsensical put-upon false names. Thankfully this year they traded their gothic for psychedelia for their second album “Primary Colours” A title of which is incredibly fitting at describing such an amalgamation of sounds, tripped out beyond belief that just blurts out tertiary to me. Songs like “Three Decades”, “Who Can Say”, “Scarlet Fields” and the fantastic album ender “Sea Within A Sea” that are so totally full of emotion, lasting feeling and fear. There is definitely such a level of fear to Faris Badwan’s vocal that it is not just a screach at the listener, but something that sounds like a plea, and the singing is his release. I love the album, so much because of the music that fills it and live, it is just as amazing to witness, their shoegaze transformation, is one that has been enacted brilliantly and one that could not have come at a better time for their career and to be their “second, more mature album” which is a step in not only the right direction, but a good hint of what they could exploit in the future.
Listen to “Scarlet Fields”:

8. Andrew Bird – Noble Beast

Definitely the best indie-folk album of the year, it’s not often you get to listen to a song about liking a song, and Andrew Bird is able to capture that very well. Listen to “Anonanimal”, probably one of my favorite songs of the year, combining loop pedals and the pizzacarto method to great effect. The album is consistent, but yet still diverse, making it very interesting to listen to. The only thing I would say, Andrew Bird plays the songs so much better live. This session of him playing for pitchfork is actually amazing, it literally is just mesmerizing. It’s a shame that the album isn’t as good as his live sets, otherwise he would be much higher on the top ten albums. Nonetheless, the album is a great piece of work.
Listen to “Anonanimal”:

7. Mos Def – The Ecstatic

Mos Def, before this album, to me was more of an actor than a rapper, but The Ecstatic definitely proves his artistic talent/merit/worth behind the mike. It’s led me to delve deeper into his back catalogue, including his Talib Kwalli-accompanying duo Blackstar. But this album definitely shows off everything about Mos Def that is brilliant, epic, epic flow, undeniably great beats and best off all, lyrics that got some serious meaning and touch upon topics very much in the public eye. Just listen to the fantastic “Auditorium” below. The Iraq War mention really gets me, showing the side of the rap game that does care about the image it portrays to the youth. Def consistently drops great songs across this album, like “Supermagic”, “Priority” and “Workers Comp” that keep you wanting more, here’s hoping that he returns to the studio sooner rather than later.
Listen to “Auditorium”:

6. Dirty Projectors – Bitte Orca

Dirty Projectors manage to play quite upbeat music around subject that are usually found to be quite saddening. They’ve covered Black Flags album, Damaged, which sounded like Black Flag had decided to put down the angst and pick up the love. Dirty Projectors craft music incredibly well, and honestly have the best vocals I’ve ever heard. Bitte Orca definitely shows this off well, every track definitely has some pop in it, but at the same time, not loosing its integrity and structure. The album seems to take some influence from R&B, as you feel as if you should be dancing. Everything on the album seems so well thought out, with vocals almost doing call and response with the guitar on “Remade Horizon”. This album will turn anyone’s frown into a smile.
Listen to titular chorus chanting “Useful Chamber”;

5. Blakroc – Blakroc

The Black Keys and the legends of the hip hop industry have definitely made one killer album. The two groups have blended their styles to create a raw, fresh, psychedelic hip hop. It’s not very often you can call something “rock ‘n’ roll”, but with Blakroc, you say it with out a doubt in your voice. Every track is a banger on this album, but if I had to choose one that really got my attention, it would have to be “What You Do To Me”, featuring Nicole Wray, Billy Danze and Jim Jones. This album isn’t just an album of the year, this is an album of the decade.
Listen to Nathan’s favourite, “Dollaz & Sense”:

4. Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavilion

I’ll admit that I’d never heard of Animal Collective until this year and one brilliant, brilliant, brilliant album (as well as a sublime EP) later, I love them. “Merriweather Post Pavilion” is quite simply, an album just full of brilliant songs from a band that really have come to represent the face of progressive rock, I know that is kind of pigeon-holing them, but thats probably the simplest way to define them. The songs that fill it are just fantastic, there are brilliant song like “Brother Sport” and “Summertime Clothes” whose fantastic beats and rhythm are consistent throughout the album. But seriously, it’s all about one song for me. “My Girls” is surely one of the best songs this year, even ever and definitely one of my favourites. It builds and builds and AnCo craft every little aspect of perfection about it. It is just such a well made song that it reeks of high quality songwriting and producing coupled with what can only be perceived as a highly expanded mind, or a large imagination. This song to me, certainly creates and represents alot of what 2009 was to me, a rather large creative board to jump on, one to expand to and grow from.

3. The xx – xx – (Review)

Who would of thought that one of this year’s best debuts would be from a 4 (now 3) piece of seemingly depressed 19 year olds. But it was. The xx have gone on to produce a debut album fully formed in it’s almost perfect, over-produced-so-its-ridiculously-dark way. And each song has beauty to it, the warring vocals, the minimalist music, with such a sexy bass that its hard to not want to dance along. Live as well, they totally reproduce this sense of a bleak, desolate landscape, making some kind of big open space of music that totally consumes and devours your soul. If you don’t feel some kind of hurt or remembrance of a bad relationship and are totally unfazed by this album then you are not human. Songs as perfect as “Crystallised” and “Basic Space” are hard to ignore, whilst the rest of the album, including the dare-I-say-it-album-highlight, almost instrumental “Intro”, construct a brilliant set of songs that many would be jealous of as a debut. I think out of the whole list, this album is the most accessible, and maybe not my favourite but definitely my highest recommendation.
Listen to “Basic Space”:

2. Grizzly Bear – Veckatimest – (Review)

Grizzly Bear had one job ahead of them when they finished Yellow House, a universally loved album. Veckatimist has most definitely done the job. The album was composed by the whole band, which in a lot of cases will go terribly wrong. But for Grizzly Bear, its created an album with sound and vision. It’s very diverse, with songs like “Two Weeks”, an uplifting song, with a sharp piano and epic chorus, alongside songs such as “All We Ask”, a whisper of a song, that builds up to a marching chorus. Grizzly Bear have definitely got a long career in the music industry.

1. Wavves – Wavvves – (Review)

If you read my original review, you will already know of the deep, deep love I have for Wavves’ sophomore effort, an album, which totally epitomizes teenage life to me. It is just so fully brilliant. So underproduced that it seems like must be fake and so fake sounding that comes back sounding authentic again. That may sound totally stupid, but it isn’t, despite some contrived nature to the songs, Wavves made a brilliant album that has to be acclaimed, it is full of mistakes but nothing is perfect. And it is its own self knowledge of its mistakes that it succeeds on. Songs like “So Bored” are brilliant, no joke, everything is just so like “Yeah” (and believe my seriousness in that they are just so good and above all WORK) that it is outright as both a brilliant piece of music and a teen anthem. I could not love them anymore, and the album is full of little lo-fi masterpieces, “Friends Are Gone”, “Beach Demon”, “No Hope Kids”, yeah the list goes on. Just listen to this album as soon as possible people!
Start off with “So Bored” now:

I keep forgetting about this band, then remembering them, and then wondering why I keep forgetting about them.

BLK JKS are South African rock, based in Johannesburg. They had built up a massive amount of hype on the internet awhile back, with their EP “Mystery”, which is awesome.
They take a lot of influence from ska, reggae, ambience, jazz, prog, and dub. This brew of genre’s work’s really well, with no dominant genre, they all balance each other out. Infact they sound a little like if “Yeasayer” and “TV on the Radio” decided to do a collab.
The “Mystery EP” in general is mesmerizing, one track that stood out was “Summertime”. Cliche it may sound, the song did remind me of summer, the upbeat tempo and the explosions of Jimi Hendrix, definitely had an influence on that matter. Much like the rest of the EP its slightly haunting, with the echo’s and reverb becoming almost synth like. What really does it for me though, is the flow the EP has, the tracks have been written and placed well within the EP, and has as much flow as would an album. Something a lot of EP’s fail to deliver these days.

They released their album in september, and are also touring it in Europe as I am writing this, they are due to do a few dates in the UK from the 26th to the 29th of November. For more information check out their blog.

Summertime – BLK JKS

A few months ago, I read the ultimate graphic novel, Alan Moore’s Watchmen. It is indeed an amazingly good book. I don’t normally cross over other media into this music based blog, but Watchmen is a story I read and can see it cinematically as well as imagining a great soundtrack to accompany it. I’ve seen the film yet, read first though as I thought it would be sacrilege to see it before i had read the novel. Although good, I have to admit that I was disappointed by it as a whole. It misses out major parts of the novel, but it is visually an impressive like-for-like copy. I even wrote notation on what i liked and what I didn’t, the dislikes out weigh the likes by a strong margin.

The soundtrack though, was one of the best things about the film, it had some inspired choices, including Hendrix. But, here is an alternative soundtrack formed from ideas when I first read the novel. I’ve compiled a short playlist to go with each of the 12 chapters of Watchmen.

Chapter 1
The Futureheads – He Knows

Chapter 2
Joy Division – Dead Souls

Chapter 3
Blondie – Heart of Glass

Chapter 4
Arcade Fire – My Body Is A Cage

Chapter 5
Radiohead – Karma Police

Chapter 6
Thom Yorke – Skip Divided

Chapter 7
The Strokes – What Ever Happened?

Chapter 8
Fleet Foxes – Heard Them Stirring

Chapter 9
The Cribs – Ancient History

Chapter 10
AC/DC – Back in Black

Chapter 11
Elle Milano – This Is How It Ends

Chapter 12
Echo & The Bunnymen – The Killing Moon

Listen and you’ll hopefully enjoy.

I play video games, quite a lot of them to be fair and when something thats as good as the recently released Modern Warfare 2 comes out, obviously a lot of hype was built up for it, and justifiably so! i got the game on release day, love it. Just brilliant. But what really got me ridiculously hyped up was this following ad. I just thought it fitting to post it, I know a little late, but what’s really great is the way that the music is cut to it and how bloody cinematic it is! What’s up with that? It has really achieved the sense of a Hollywood blockbuster. Watch (IN HD!!) and be amazed.

It’s actually a rather cinematic game, the story has all the hallmarks of an over the top action movie and some great set-pieces like a russian-invaded, derelict and decaying Washington D.C. But for me this trailer signifies a shift, a shift in the way that games are launched and also considered, the massive hype and longing for this game lead to madness, Sainsburys sold it for £26 to massive success, both local branches has completely sold out, about an hour after opening (Yes, I checked). Games are now basically on the same level as any album or film, well Games of this level of anticipation and expected sales. It’s mental, at the end of the day its a machine, but one that looks and plays pretty darn well.

Here’s the Eminem/Nate Dogg song featured in that ad;
‘Till I Collapse

The real horrorshow gang has become two people, with myself now part of this rad rad blog. I am lewi, friend of nathan, and tonight matthew, I’m going to blog some shit that blows my mind.

So I’ll start with a guy who may of already been blogged quite a bit, however he’s actually killing it right now. My mum said I’m to young to be in love, but after listening to Gold Panda, I heartily disagree.
For lovers of; Prefuse 73, Koushik, and Four Tet, Gold Panda manipulates samples like a Derren Brown manipulates minds. He has three records out at the moment, Quitters Raga (Single), Before EP, and Miyamae EP.

Quitters Raga, is the claim to fame, its soft rustling and sitar like sample work awesomely, whilst a pulsating piano sample plays through out. All over a beat that reminds of me elephants migrating.

Gold Panda is one to watch. Currently on Witchita, he is planning remixes for HEALTH and Simian Mobile Disco, which no doubt should be sick. Here I leave you with a remix of The Field track “I have the moon, you have the internet”, taken in a direction that works well with the original song, nicely cut up into little bits for us to enjoy.

Gold Panda – Quitters Raga

The Field – I Have The Moon, You Have The Internet (Gold Panda Remix)

I don’t know if you’ve seen these already, but the brilliant littlepixel has remade an entire set of album covers as classic penguin/pelican books.

Go here to see them all, really brilliant I must say, and all great re-imaginings of some truly classic albums.

Now, for two unrelated, but thematically linked songs, get it?
The Rakes – Open Book
Born Ruffians – Knife (Grizzly Bear Cover)

It’s November, middle of autumn, and a time of nostalgia, especially as this year marks the end of the first decade of the 21st Century. The last ten years have been awfully good for music fans. And I didn’t start properly taking an interest in music until at the earliest 2003. Shame on me. But retrospect is a good thing and its been the last few years where I’ve looked back at some of the best albums that I’ve been able to pick the ones that I have for each year. It’s nothing to do with what was popular, critically or chart-wise, but my own favourites. Decisions made by me, and also I’ve collated some lists of friends of mine, for the next post, who share a similiar passion for music. Here’s the choices!

2000: RADIOHEAD – KID A
I didn’t properly get into Radiohead until the release of Thom Yorke’s stellar The Eraser, after that I picked up Kid A from my step-dad, listening to this album definitely made me think about music a lot more deeply and look past the more conventional set up of bands. I just love how this album is set up, the brilliance in the music itself and the sheer nerve or Radiohead to go and make something totally a shift in the opposite direction of what was expected of them. Idioteque is definitely a close second to Reckoner for my favourite Radiohead song ever, its probably their best live track too.

2001: THE STROKES – IS THIS IT?
This is an album that I could probably pick up and listen to at any point in the day/week/month/year, you get the idea. What I’m trying to say is that The Strokes have made an album that is not only one of the best debuts ever, also probably one of the best albums ever made, let alone this decade. Built around solid singles and consistently good tracks, its hard to find a fault, if any, in the album. Last Nite, Someday, Hard To Explain, it contains much too many of my favourite songs ever written to not be included in this list.

2002: THE LIBERTINES – UP THE BRACKET
I love the Libertines, every few months or so there is word of a reform, especially within the british press, the band that would instantly sell out a nationwide tour and are perhaps one of the best british bands of the decade if not ever, their lasting legacy and impact on the indie music scene after two albums and the too many to metion in-quarrels between enigmatic joint frontmen, Pete Doherty and Carl Barat, have made a big impression and any of their subsuqent music projects, with Babyshambles being the most evident and prolific, have gone onto almost instant success. This debut is brilliant. 2002 was a tough choice, not much really came out then, it was either this or Nas’ God’s Son albuim, and after listening to “Vertigo” and “Death on the Stairs” I knew that the Libertines had won out. Fantastic lyricism, sharp and quick guitar hooks that make for charming indie rock songs as well as the odd anthemn with songs like “Time For Heroes” and “Boys In The Band”, this definitely set a precadent and is even better than their subsuqent self-titled follow up in my opinion.

2003: KINGS OF LEON – YOUTH AND YOUNG MANHOOD
This is the album, that started it all. I became obsessed with listening to good music from here on out, Kings of Leon have gone on to disappoint, but look back to the brilliance of their debut album and you can see why they were/are one of the best bands to emerge this decade. The wispy vocals, the sharp guitars, every aspect of each song made this album a classic, for me the only slightly weak track is closer Dusty, but even that is a good song, if you are one of the fools who liked KOL from their last album onwards, do yourself a favour and go and get this now. NOW.

2004: THE FUTUREHEADS – S/T
I chose the futureheads, simply because I remember picking up their album and falling in love with it. It is easily their best work to date, which is rather unfortunate, but nonetheless, they crafted a brilliant post-punk debut that is full of jattery, loud guitars and lovely northern-sounding harmonies with vocals bordering spoken word, not that that is a bad thing though, the way they work together is probably pretty close to the Beatles way of singing, especially evident on lovely single “Hounds of Love” (2005 re-release addition I know, but whos counting) and that cover of Kate Bush’s work not only bettered it, but brought into the indie anthemn’s of this decade. It’s fantastically brilliant. Other highlights, include; “Decent Days and Nights”, “Meantime” and the opener “Le Garage” which has such a bloody good typical english use of broken french in its chorus.

2005: SUFJAN STEVENS – ILLINOIS
Ok, i didn’t actually hear this album till 2008, I’m sorry, but Sufjan is nowhere near as big in the UK, he is fantastic though and by listening to this album, in my opinion the best travelling album, I feel quickly in love with his musical brilliance, it’s an album in which anyone can find something to enjoy, from the sweeping, epic, to the downright soothing and possibly depressing as well as pretty morbid, (John Wayne Gacy, Jr, anyone?) this album has such distinct mix of style, mood and subject that it is impossible not to be impressed, even if the 50 states project was revealed to be probably a joke, this album is one that shows the talent, the amazing talent of Sufjan, his decade long career almost, spearhead by this middle of the road album is a piece of utter brilliance that cannot be missed for any supposed “music lover”

2006: ARCTIC MONKEYS – WHATEVER PEOPLE SAY I AM, THAT’S WHAT I’M NOT
I could not ignore this album. What is now one of my favourite albums ever made, one of the highlights of the decade and evident of the change in the music industry in the latter half of this decade is also a fantastic social document of Britain and it’s youth. Listen to the scathing, shallow lyrics, Turner’s voice spitting with a spurned nature, as if not he himself an outcast but his generation as a whole and surely the next ones to come after that. As soon as this album opens with the impressive drum skills of chavviest band memeber ever, Matt Helders, on “The View From The Afternoon”, the songs flow into their gloomy, pessimistic, teenage stance, that hundreds of bands have now tried to copy. They did it originally, and with lyrics like the ones on this debut, they have not been matched or dare I day it, match their own debut.

2007: RADIOHEAD – IN RAINBOWS
Sorry, but I couldn’t help choose Radiohead twice, if Kid A was more a retrospective choice of what was actually good that year, In Rainbows is a choice I made because once I got this album and began to listen to it, I was enthralled. I loved it, every second of listening to it. It was like some own personal discovery for myself as well because it was music that transcended music to be more a state of art and beauty, just fantastic. The way they released it was just convienent, paying nothing was a joy, but that the music itself was as great as it is, makes me go back to this nearly two year old album again and again, I love Radiohead, and their brilliance, live they are just as fantastic, and they have encapsulated this decade for me, with this album, it’s perfect.

2008: METRONOMY – NIGHTS OUT
I love this, I think it’s kind of an odd choice seeing as I first picked Girl Talk as my favourite last year, but that album is so, uh, boring? after the umpteen listen, I love the whole mashup thing, but kind of look on it and think, this is immature and stupid, and I don’t enjoy it like I did, so Metronomy steps in to save the day. Out of all the albums released last year, this is the one I always go back to, always listen to it, it represents 2008 for me in a great way, all the fun/heartbreak/new people etc etc, it was an odd year, but it’s cool, now, looking back. I enjoyed it. Songs like “Heartbreaker” and “My Heart Rate Rapid” are just fantastic and that epic intro itself, leading into “The End of You Too”, I think I kind of slated this album originallly, but I actually adore it now and every little nuisance about it, kind of melted away, as a whole it is fantastic, you can nitpick it all you want but this album to me, signifies a great time of my life. It’s well teenage init?

2009: WAVVES – WAVVVES
This year, I have to go with Wavves, not because I’m some kind of hipster who buys into fads but because I genuinely LOVE this album, yeah it’s distort as FUCK, but who cares? Nathan Williams, he sings from the heart, making anthemns about teenage life, the simplicity of it, the innocence and sense of belonging to, while smoking the obligatory spliff and skating/surfing the west coast. or so that is the picture it paints. The music itself, all recorded by Williams, shows at least promise and a good level of musical ability that althought distorted and crackly still shines through, the sheer under-production which seems to be more than just a lack of effort also makes it excitingly cool. It’s surfer-easy-punk, but that stuff just makes it real listenable for me, easy to understand and to dance to and also to appreciate. Those who slate it just should take a step back and look and think, this is an idealised view on teenage life, don’t take it so seriously!

A few songs to sample;
The Libertines – Vertigo
The Futureheads – Hounds of Love
Metronomy – The End of You Too

You probably haven’t heard of Tubelord I would gather, but they are a band that everyone should listen to, because I’m sure they will become alot bigger than they are now. Recently signed to Hassle, Tubelord are a British band that are simply astounding, I saw them live the other day in Southampton and was totally blown away by how their music transitions to a live environment. Even before I was really into them, I heard praise of them from many of my friends, I picked up the I am Azzerad EP a couple of months ago, which I really enjoyed. The quality even then was fantastic, but the album promises better recordings and a greater achieved sound. Does it deliver? Yes.

As soon as it begins, you can tell that the band have benefited greatly from an enhanced studio, it’s not just them simply singing in a higher pitch or extended songs, the quality is much better so it becomes fantastic. Straight from the opening of the album, with “Your Bed is Kind of Frightening”, the echoing of ’sleep it’s over’ in the begin and then when it crashes into the sonic disruption practically trademarked by the band. Follows on with the song “Somewhere Out There Is a Dog On Fire”, the ‘Blada bleep, blada bleep’ lyric, they subsistuted for “Meryl Streep, Meryl Streep’ live, that sounded weirdly better. But again the album quality flows through this song, my personal favourite and definite standout, “Night of Pencils” just reeks brilliance, in my opinion the song sounds so much better now, real stand out song from the album and I wouldn’t be surprised if it was headed for a re-release as a single.

Other highlights for me include the eternally awesome “I Am Azerrad” and “Synthesize” both originally from the former song’s EP release. Having the original recordings, the new albums versions are most definitely of a better quality. In conclusion, definitely seek out and buy this album and it is sincerely one of my favourites of the year, I just love it, as much unfounded negative press that this release may have been getting, I can’t help but enjoy Tubelord. Buy it now.

Download Night Of Pencils

The tooth-shatteringly loud Battle For Paris are a band I’ve seen live twice now and been consecutively impressed with. So in your face and confrontational sounding that it belies how good the music is. It’s not just fight music, their sound is awesome. The “With A Gun Between Your Teeth, You Only Speak In Vowels” EP is their debut release, on the brighton based Tangled Talk records and it opens with the frankly fantastic and live favourite of mine, “Fuck Your Deja Vu” which I blogged before in a previous gig review. The song is a perfect choice for the opener, and sets up the second two tracks for the listener really well. It’s loud, abrasive quality to the music contrasting with the shouting/screaming/sometimes singing vocals works really damn well, which follows with a similar fashion into the next song, “Baby, You Are My Ammunition Dump”

My favourite though is the ender, “I Have the Jigsaw Man’s Hands (Download) and its frankly epic bass intro. Which nicely juxtaposes itself against the rest of the song. I do love the band, really do, but there is only one nagging problem I find with this EP, it is essentially fulfilling a void until I actually see them live oncemore, their brilliant and obviously consistent stage presence and live showmanship is a sight overwhelmingly brilliant to watch, something that you need to witness for yourself. This EP IS good, don’t get me wrong, but I can’t help but feel that Battle For Paris lose some of their charm when recording, but nonetheless, buy the EP, check them out, support this great band and make sure you see them live.

Myspace
Tangled Talk Records

Editors have gone all synthpop on our asses. Where the first two albums they were Joy Division, they’ve now become New Order, without the lead-singer suicide. Ok, Editors haven’t just been blatant rip offs of Joy Division, they’ve actually carved a nice little niche for themselves, whilst taking influence from that seminal Manchester band. Their lovingly depressing rock was capitialised with two fantastic albums; “The Back Room” and “An End Has A Start” which were both brilliant and the sophomore effort definitely started the shift towards what this album has granted.

It could be considered more euphoric? I question that, because simply I am undecided, listening to the brilliant first single, “Papillon”, its so uplifting, despite morose lyrics plus, you can hear “Blue Monday”, seriously it’s underneath the song. But that’s irrelevant, they may have had a lot of different points of reference and influence, their music has evolved, yeah you could call it still an aspect of mainstream, but it’s so nice and also refreshing that a band swapping guitars for synths actually can pull it off well! There is also a stronger sense of an industrial sound behind them, ok, the first album with songs like “Munich” pulled that aspect off, but the synth power, reminiscent of Kraftwerk, definitely with the second song of the album “Bricks and Mortar”, a favourite of mine off the album, you can also detect a Depeche Mode influence. Anyway, the song is really like, just happy, yet sombre. It’s the juxtaposition in their songs on this album that really do it for me, it comes across with really contrasting music and lyrics, I adore how the songs do come together in their various elements.

My favourite song on the album sounds to me, alot like New Order’s “True Faith” and by taking a leaf out of Radiohead’s book with a bizaare song title (“Eat Raw Meat = Blood Drool”, I mean what is up with that?) Editors have a song here, being the penultimate of the album, which stands heads and shoulders above the rest of it, in my opinion. It is brilliance. Pure brilliance. I saw this live on Jools Holland a few weeks back and it was just a fantastic performance from the band, so outgoing, bold and the music just stood out strongly.
I heartily recommend this change of direction for Editors, it has proven a brave and great move, the songs sound good and as ever lead singer Tom’s almost monotonous voice, which has definitely improved, sounds ever more brilliant. Get it now, my favourite track for download below
Editors – Eat Raw Meat = Blood Drool