TURQUOISE DAYS ALBUMS OF THE YEAR Pt. THREE
THE DEARS - No Cities Left
After my fanzine, Red Roses For Me was up to its third issue we ended up on a bunch of mailing lists for promos. Seemed like heaven, an endless stream of new releases, and an irate postman who couldn’t fit the mailers through the letterbox. The problem was sitting down to review the things and finding after a while I was just listening to the music with a detached ear, not enjoying the music, just trying to work out what to write. I found myself constantly comparing the music to other bands. Everything I listened to, even records I loved, I’d be left thinking, “that bit sounds like whoever.” Soon after I decided formal reviews were not for me. Connected with this one thing that irks me is when people tell me “Well they’re ok, but so and so did it so much better 15 years ago.” That’s all well and good, but does that mean they have copyright on that style of music, that guitar sound, or that type of lyrics? No, and if you’re that bothered I’m sure you can just buy that band’s next remastered CD set with bonus disc of crap that wasn’t good enough to release first time around! My point is, I don’t want a carbon copy of The Stone Roses or whoever but if a band comes along who clearly loved them and include part of that sound amongst their own that’s just fine with me.
I’m sure you’ve seen the reviews for The Dears album, “blah blah The Smiths, blah blah Blur, blah blah Britpop.” So?! Well done, the band obviously love these bands, and it’s probably just me but I also hear in the strings hints of the much maligned My Life Story but when this is added to such a series of dramatic highs like this album I’ve got no complaints. As long as Morrissey doesn’t come out and say how much he likes them they’ll be fine. Here’s two songs from “No Cities Left” and one from their almost as good “End Of A Hollywood Bedtime Story” mini album.
Download (apple users need to right click today) - The Dears - We Can Have It
Download - The Dears - Lost In The Plot
Download - The Dears - Heartless Romantic
Click the logo/album for all your Dears purchases
2 comments:
I'm guilty of the whole "they're ok, but so and so did it better before" thing. I'm on the old side so a lot of things sound very familiar to me lately, but I should be a little more open-minded. When I hear so much hype about some bands, though, I can't help but respond in the above stated manner. It's funny, though, because sometimes I hear stuff that I really like that reminds me of a band from the past and I don't think negatively about them. Hmmm... sometimes it's hard to not be a bit of a hypocrite. Thanks for continuing the great posts.
When you start getting promos, you feel obligated, etc. and it takes the fun out of it and you fall into ruts ... blogs are cool as long because the costs are cheap... the pitfall is that you don't get obsessed by hits, and links, and wanting ego gratification. I just write when I'm inspired and publish only when it "feels right" (of course I then spend 2 hours obsessively doing editing on the stuff I just published ha ha). I'm not sure if this was on topic but just wanted to say it.
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