So
Arular came out today and like a good consumer, the first thing I did after class was head out to Atomic Records to pick up a copy. I wanted the lyrics and writing credits more than anything. Dude at the counter pronounced it
mee-ya, but that's ok. Some things of note:
1. I remember reading somewhere that "Hombre" was produced by Richard X, but the booklet says otherwise. Apparently "Hombre" was done by someone else, while "Amazon" and "10 Dollar" are the X tracks. "10 Dollar" makes a lot of sense now that I think about it. And I wasn't too far off with the "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" comparison, considering the Girls On Top mashup he did between it and that Kraftwerk song. It all makes sense now! Anyway, as far as pop producers go, Richard X is on an unbelievable roll right now. Too bad the guy's output arrives at a snail's pace.
2. Steve Mackey (of Pulp) cowrote and coproduced "Sunshowers" and "Galang", but I think everyone knew that already. Justine Frischmann cowrote "Galang". That's just weird.
3. "M.I.A." is the bonus hidden track and they did that annoying thing where they merged it with "Galang" by inserting a moment of silence in between. Ugh. It's the worst track on here, and I would have almost preferred them to leave it off. I guess the U.K. version is going to have "URAQT" as a bonus, which would have been a hot addition here.
4. After having spent over two months with this album now, I can say that it's held up very, very well. If I had any balls whatsoever, I'd call it perfect (if you ignore "M.I.A"). I just don't do that though, so we'll just have to settle for "feels like a 10, so it's probably a 9". Album of this century so far.
And stop shaking your head. Endless hyperbole is justified sometimes.
E-mail from the Saint Etienne fan club:Dear Shane (Member number:511)
Here’s the latest Saint Etienne info:
The new album “Tales from Turnpike House” will now be released on the 6th of June 2005, with the first single “Side Streets” coming out on May 30th. The track listing for the album is as follows:
Sun in my Morning
Milk Bottle Symphony
Lightning Strikes Twice
Slow Down at the Castle
Good Thing
Side Streets
Last Orders for Gary Stead
Stars above Us
Relocate (feat. David Essex)
The Birdman of EC1
Teenage Winter
Goodnight
The first few thousand copies of the album will come with a free E.P. of parent friendly children’s music including “You Can Count on Me” (which was aired at the recent N.Y.E show) which is a taster of an upcoming project.
Hope this whet’s your appetite
Sarah, Bob & Pete XXX
PS We were overwhelmed with response for the fanclub and have now run out of cds and are getting more membership cards printed up, so apologies if you haven’t received anything yet.
Err...ummmm...maybe not. After a few more listens, the black marks come to the forefront. Particularly bad is the way Mr. Martin sings that "Let's talk. Let's tah-ah-ah-alk" part. There he goes again infusing that unbearable I AM SO SENSITIVE business into the songs. I'm not particularly enthused with the intro either, with that distant guitar in a wind tunnel sound. Kind of corny. It's too bad, as I really like the eighties echo-jangle guitar and the nice punchy rhythm. The Kraftwerk riff works really well too, as long as you block out the association. I have to downgrade this from really good, to skimming the surface of good. It is the first Coldplay song I've ever liked though, so that's got to be worth something.
So this song "Talk" by Coldplay... It's actually really good. (I think)
I don't even know who I am anymore.
