Intimacy – Bloc Party

Year Released: 2008

Label: Wichita

Year Bought: 2008

Bloc Party's first two albums were absolute mainstays of my uni years, but their third, 2008's 'Intimacy', didn't touch the sides.

All I remember of this album is that they were trying to be nu-rave and the beginning bit of 'Mercury'.

Listening to this album for the first time in 16 years, I can see why I didn't get on with it at the time. It's a dense, loud album, with hardly any room in the songs for air. The drums – and drum machines – are all very in-your-face so it is a struggle to really sit and actually listen to.

The use of electronic drums is one of the main departures from Bloc Party's previous efforts, which for me is a real shame. One of the strengths of the group was that Matt Tong was a one-man drum machine, and using actual drum machines just feels like a step backwards.

Opening song 'Ares' kicks things off with a searing guitar and huge drums that sound like something from Basement Jaxx. Then in comes Kele Okereke's voice and it just doesn't work. His tone and timbre are all wrong for this sort of speak-singing delivery. It just sounds too thin and the track is all over the place.

'Mercury' is more of the same, but by the third track, 'Halo', you feel like you're listening to Bloc Party, not Bloc Party trying to be another band.

There's not really any classic songs on the album. The best are 'One Month Off' - until a god awful key change that even Westlife would be embarrassed about; 'Ion Square'- which has a bit of the 'This Modern Love' swing and a nice build up; and 'Biko', which sounds like old school Bloc Party thanks to its arpeggiated guitars.

The theme of the album is about a relationship coming to an end, and there's some painfully honest lyrics from Okereke which are genuinely powerful. "Cause I love my mind when I'm fucking you, slowed down to a crawl," he sings on 'Ion Square', and "I left you blueberries in the fridge, the little things that I can do," on Biko.

'Zephyrus' is an interesting track worth checking out. It mixes a choir with electronic drums, using the voices as a string section. It almost works.

Within a couple of years, Everything, Everything would come along and do this sort of thing much better.

4/10

Comments

Franz Ferdinand – Franz Ferdinand

Year Released: 2004 Label: Domino Year Bought: 2004 January 2004. I'd just quit uni. Was back at the family home in Bishop's Stortford. The place I'd been so desperate to get away from, and I was back and already bored. And then things got a bit less boring. I remember this so clearly. I was having a shower and the radio was on, and on came 'Take Me Out'. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. At first I thought it must be an old tune that had passed me by, but no, it was announced as a new song by a band called Franz Ferdinand. It sounded glorious. It sounded interesting. After the staleness of the post-Britpop years, and beigeness of Coldplay, Travis et al, there was actually a British band doing something interesting. I loved it, and when the album came out the next month, I gobbled it up with glee. Listening back now, and I still love it. The hushed opening of 'Jacqueline', the sleaze of 'The Dark of the Matinee', the homoeroticism of 'M...

The Best of David Bowie 1969/1974 – David Bowie

Year Released: 1997 Label: EMI Year Bought: 1999 My love of Bowie started as a wind up. There was a rumour round our school that one of the French teachers used to go out with Bowie, so as part of my ambition to be a cocky little shit I decided to try to sneak some Bowie song titles into our lessons. "I don't understand how this verb ch-ch-ch-changes, Miss" – that sort of thing. It turned out that not only had she dated him, she was still friends with him, and even had side-of-the-stage tickets when he played Glastonbury in 2000. She might still be the coolest person I've ever known. In my bid to learn some more Bowie tunes I dug out my mum's old vinyls and fell in love with 'Hunky Dory'. For Christmas 1999, my mum got me 2 CDs, this one, which covers 1969/74, and the next one which goes up to 1979. That Christmas, I had them both on repeat as I played FIFA 2000 on the PC (which had a picture of pre-Judas Sol Campbell on the cover). This compilation reall...

Eye To The Telescope – KT Tunstall

Year Released: 2004 Label: Relentless Year Bought: No Idea I'm not sure why I have this record. I have no record of buying it. I've never listened to it. But then I do own two Dido albums so it's not exactly out of character of me to have it. I've always thought KT Tunstall was a pretty cool person. She's clearly talented. But this album, I just can't really connect with it. There's some good tunes on here. 'Black Horse and the Cherry Tree' is great, as is 'Suddenly I See'. 'Another Place To Fall' hints at some darker tones, and 'Under The Weather' builds nicely. But overall it's just all a bit safe. I vaguely remember reading an interview with Tunstall a few years after this came out in which she said the original mix was a lot more rough and bluesy, but the label wanted it more polished. You can definitely hear how this album could have been scuffed up. 'Stopping The Love' is a good example of that. It's a mi...

All The Records I've Ever Owned

Search This Blog