Overblown Fragile Minstrels,
After all that festival nonsense, it’s good to get back to the bread and butter of musicology.
I read or heard that it would be released in July; a July release wouldn’t have made much sense. Bombshell by King Creosote was worth waiting for. The previous album, KC Rules OK, was fantastic but Kenny had some issues with it, admitting some songs were too long. It seems that those glitches, those debatable glitches, have disappeared. Many reviews say that KC is reaching out for the mainstream, if that’s what this is, if the mainstream exists, if that’s where the money is, then very few artists are more deserving of a few more pounds. However, I don’t see it happening. KC hasn’t betrayed the folk scene, he hasn’t dropped the instruments that have made previous works so brilliant and he hasn’t started writing songs about big fat girls, umbrellas or that kind of thing. And mostly importantly, and also most sadly, the radio stations haven’t started playing his songs more often (BBC 6th Music is best placed to do so and they haven’t so, they must be held accountable). The genius of this work is that KC, perhaps along with his producer (Jon Hopkins), creates amazing auras with the accordion, keyboards, acoustic guitars or whatever, that perfectly showcase stories told by the most emotive voice. I was won over by this album after 30 seconds of the first track, Leslie. It’s an album to spend some time with in order to work out the story of each song, the lyrics are good enough to allow this to be done. There is an excellent and novel review in the Guardian that is worth reading.
The other album that I’ve spent some time with recently is The Fragile Army, the latest offering of The Polyphonic Spree. I understand many people have written them off as a novelty act; numbers (everyone will know someone who knows someone who was or is in The Polyphonic Spree) and outfits do that. I also understand that their live performances and festival appearances don’t really equate to album sales. I’ve always liked them, I have nothing bad to say about them. The Fragile Army is still happy, the orchestration is still epic, but on the whole, it’s less happy than before. There will always be happiness in numbers for this lot. Get Up and Go (Section 23) is perhaps where this new found dourness begins, “waking up to a sad note, delivered yesterday, you might like to think you’re in love” is one of the lines of the choruses, the song is about taking blows. However, by Section 25, Younger Yesterday, they're exulting their strength, “now we know, we’re beautiful”. Arcade Fire have shown that these are dark times and musicians have to react to them, for me, The Fragile Army is better than Neon Bible, it may not be so politically motivated, but it does not have the few blatantly rubbish songs that Neon Bible does. Their cover of Nirvana’s Lithium is sublime, I look upon Nirvana unfavourably and it has taken this lot to show me that there have been something in that Nirvana thing after all. The Polyphonic Spree is worth sticking with, all those people can’t be wrong.
I read or heard that it would be released in July; a July release wouldn’t have made much sense. Bombshell by King Creosote was worth waiting for. The previous album, KC Rules OK, was fantastic but Kenny had some issues with it, admitting some songs were too long. It seems that those glitches, those debatable glitches, have disappeared. Many reviews say that KC is reaching out for the mainstream, if that’s what this is, if the mainstream exists, if that’s where the money is, then very few artists are more deserving of a few more pounds. However, I don’t see it happening. KC hasn’t betrayed the folk scene, he hasn’t dropped the instruments that have made previous works so brilliant and he hasn’t started writing songs about big fat girls, umbrellas or that kind of thing. And mostly importantly, and also most sadly, the radio stations haven’t started playing his songs more often (BBC 6th Music is best placed to do so and they haven’t so, they must be held accountable). The genius of this work is that KC, perhaps along with his producer (Jon Hopkins), creates amazing auras with the accordion, keyboards, acoustic guitars or whatever, that perfectly showcase stories told by the most emotive voice. I was won over by this album after 30 seconds of the first track, Leslie. It’s an album to spend some time with in order to work out the story of each song, the lyrics are good enough to allow this to be done. There is an excellent and novel review in the Guardian that is worth reading.
The other album that I’ve spent some time with recently is The Fragile Army, the latest offering of The Polyphonic Spree. I understand many people have written them off as a novelty act; numbers (everyone will know someone who knows someone who was or is in The Polyphonic Spree) and outfits do that. I also understand that their live performances and festival appearances don’t really equate to album sales. I’ve always liked them, I have nothing bad to say about them. The Fragile Army is still happy, the orchestration is still epic, but on the whole, it’s less happy than before. There will always be happiness in numbers for this lot. Get Up and Go (Section 23) is perhaps where this new found dourness begins, “waking up to a sad note, delivered yesterday, you might like to think you’re in love” is one of the lines of the choruses, the song is about taking blows. However, by Section 25, Younger Yesterday, they're exulting their strength, “now we know, we’re beautiful”. Arcade Fire have shown that these are dark times and musicians have to react to them, for me, The Fragile Army is better than Neon Bible, it may not be so politically motivated, but it does not have the few blatantly rubbish songs that Neon Bible does. Their cover of Nirvana’s Lithium is sublime, I look upon Nirvana unfavourably and it has taken this lot to show me that there have been something in that Nirvana thing after all. The Polyphonic Spree is worth sticking with, all those people can’t be wrong.
posted by Leif at 10:55 PM
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