GUIDED BY NOISES
Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust
ONSIRI PRAVATTIYAGUL
The title of Sigur Ro's's fifth full length album simply translates into English as "with a buzz in our ears, we play endlessly". And that's the kind of band Sigur Ro's is - the kind you have been playing endlessly ever since their debut, Von, in 1997.
The Icelanders have given a new meaning to melancholy, and have built their reputation gradually as one of the finest post rock/experimental bands the world has ever witnessed. Album after album, Sigur Ro's has given us the kind of music that you reminisce over, contemplate, cry, complain and give birth to - it's epic, uplifting and unyielding. Not caring about pop-market parameters, Sigur Ro's have always stuck with their signature native tongue, unforgiving delays and the ethereal refrains they are known for.
Now comes Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust with its quite sharp turn in musical direction. Our Icelandic friends are suddenly sunny, happy and shiny people (well, for half of the album anyway) rather than the introverted and tortured weirdos that we have imagined them as for the past decade. Acoustic guitars, percussion and cheery vocals are now a part of the new Sigur Ro's. Within the first few seconds of listening you might think you have mistakenly put on Animal Collectives!
But Sigur Ro's's happiness is more controlled. It seems that they knew they couldn't stick with the same harrowing sound forever without giving something fresh to the listeners.
Gobbledigook opens with a bang, and its cheery "la la la la la la" lyrics perfectly signify the band's change of mood. Inni' Me'r Syngur Vitleysingur sounds like the old Sigur Ro's with glockenspiels and the signature dramatic tear-down and build-up structure, but it is a more mentally peaceful Sigur Ro's. Missing the old days? Then the roughly nine-minute-long Festival and A'ra Ba'tur are what you should tune into, but Festival would probably be better broken down into two songs.
In this world, change is inevitable, and Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust Spilum Endalaust is a most welcomed one. And yes, with a buzz in our ears, we might find ourselves playing it endlessly.
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WEEZER
Weezer (The Red Album)
- Your favourite nerds are back in town again, and this sixth time around ringleader Rivers Cuomo is finally more upbeat than ever. But in a most ironic way - the only way Weezer knows how to communicate. While Sigur Ro's is giving us happy pills on a silver plate because the world is crumbling, and they probably think we need some booster, Weezer is simply cheerful because the world is crumbling, and we're all gonna die painful deaths. Period. No redemption and sympathy here.
This is also the third time that Weezer have opted to call their album Weezer, but if you've paid the slightest attention, you'll automatically know that this latest venture will be referred to as The Red Album due to its bright red cover that features the older looking band members. This, however, is the first time that other band members have contributed to the songwriting. Age seems to have mellowed supposed control freak Cuomo.
With The Red Album, all that you love about Weezer has taken a roll call - from pumping power chords, obscure pop-culture references, self deprecating humour to caustic wit. But it somehow feels fresher and more together with a lighter approach to music making and, for want of a better word, its outlook on life. It's as if Cuomo has somehow snapped out of those life crises that endeared him to us since the '90s. Such newfound understandings just make you feel like falling head over heels in love and jumping along with Weezer again.
The first single Pork and Beans is an anthem in the making with its fist pumping power chords, while The Greatest Man That Ever Lives (Variations On A Shaker Hymn) is weirdly wonderful with its fast switches from slacker rock and operatic wailing to theatrical piano. It's hard to resist the charms of Heart Songs that pays homage (or perhaps ridicule) all the performers that seem to matter to Cuomo.
Just when you want to give up on Weezer, they come out with The Red Album and lines such as "And when it's party time, like 1999, I'll party by myself because I'm such a special guy." Rock on, really.
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