Radiohead - OK Computer (1997)

1) Airbag; 2) Paranoid Android; 3) Subterranean Homesick Alien; 4) Exit Music (For a Film); 5) Let Down; 6) Karma Police; 7) Fitter Happier; 8) Electioneering; 9) Climbing Up the Walls; 10) No Surprises; 11) Lucky; 12) The Tourist

Pre-millennial angst that changed things forevermore. You know this.

Key tracks: "Let Down", "No Surprises", "Lucky"

I'd like to think I'm good about not letting the wider critical world affect my own amateur reviews. Rather than saying this or that is overrated or underrated, or making parallels about my opinions vs everyone else's, I prefer looking at things within my own bubble - after all, it's my opinion that matters the most to my listening habits and I imagine someone would read my thoughts to learn what I personally think. With some records that's harder than others. There's a number of albums that are so universal that they form a part of our collective consciousness even if we don't care about them: albums which have been discussed and analysed so often and in such great detail due to their importance and place in the canon that there is literally nothing new to say. Most of the time, I can still comfortably get by. Enough time has passed from The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and other sacred cows that the old canon narratives are actively being argued against while new ones are established and there's a wider variety of opinions challenging the old classics, and somewhere between those lines I'm able to place my own opinion without feeling like I'm better off just linking to the relevant Wikipedia section. Not to mention that for most iconic records, I'm too much of a natural contrarian to hold them in the highest of pedestals in the first place.

OK Computer is a curveball for me in this regard. It's a landmark album, and even I agree with that - to a degree that it feels like an actual challenge to start dissecting it apart. You're not going to find unique angles to view this album through from me, is what I am saying. It's my generation's Sgt Peppers, and I'm saying that without a single ounce of hyperbole. It's a cultural milestone that has affected so much of the other music I enjoy, inspired countless other musicians and shifted genre trends. To this day it causes so much discussion, analysis and over-analysis that we are all absolutely sick of it. We can all recite from memory the story of Thom Yorke & co becoming increasingly fatigued by society and music industry at the same time as they felt their ambitions limited by their early sound, and in turn exploding in fame and finding themselves even more fatigued through the record they made to channel all of that frustration and ambition through. And if you don't, you're pretending - because OK Computer transcends any genre barrier knowledge if you're even remotely passionate about music. It's omnipresent.You can't avoid it, no matter how much you want.

Even now, OK Computer is a prime example of a band reaching for their lofty ambitions and realising the breadth of their own skill set, and taking a boundary-breaking leap within their own path. Comparing Pablo Honey and The Bends to it is practically pointless because the change is so vast: there's enough hints on both albums, particularly The Bends, to point out where OK Computer came from but the narrative is loose, the familiarities superficial at best. OK Computer effectively re-introduces Radiohead from scratch: the urban angst of grunge-era guitar walls has evolved into pre-millennial apathy and depression, and the band are musically thinking outside their own box to the point that the tropes introduced here are now aspects the band are forever associated with. Not just that, but they're also elements that are echoed within the particular kind of rock music that followed in OK Computer's wake. You can trace a direct genealogy from it to nearly everything that has been happening in indie and alternative rock since. You think of angst-laden, introspective guitars and you'll be able to trace them here.

Like all the very best progenitors, OK Computer still sounds like its own thing even now. Despite how many times its tricks have been repeated, there's nothing that combines them quite like here. Part of it is due to Radiohead's own uniqueness, the very specific traits its members have: Yorke's falsetto wailing (oft imitated, never bettered) and characteristic lyrical style most obviously, but also Jonny Greenwood's flourishes inspired by modern classical and Phil Selway's razor-sharp drumming. There's also the neurotic flair that OK Computer is powered by that has never really been captured by its followers in quite this way. Yorke was very obviously not having a good time, the band as a whole found inspiration through it and traces of it are all over the album, whether it's the resigned exhaustion of "No Surprises", the anger of "Electioneering" or the downright crippling paranoia of "Climbing Up the Walls". OK Computer frequently sounds like its suffocating within its own four walls creeping closer together, only to push them periodically away to reveal something hopeful for a fleeting moment.

OK Computer isn't Radiohead's best album. I understand why "Paranoid Android" is iconic and as admirable as its multi-suite progression is, I've never seen it as a particular discography highlight and its first part towers above the others to the point I wish it was the blueprint for the entire song, and "Electioneering" meanwhile is basically an attempt to re-do R.E.M.'s "Ignoreland" but quite simply not as good. They're good but neither are songs I could say lifts the album for me. I also just think that Radiohead started to get really interesting after they decided to deconstruct and reassemble themselves in OK Computer's aftermath, which is when their skitterish neuroses found a sound that perfectly suited it. But, I understand why it's such a revered album, and it wouldn't need a great stretch to make me into a true believer too. After all, many of their best songs are here. "Let Down" is in some days is in fact the best song they ever wrote, period, making the world-weary desire to disappear into the most gorgeous thing when in its final minutes the song jumps off a cliff and soars into the sunset on the wings of its layered vocal parts and intensifying instrumental section. "Karma Police" is one of Radiohead's most haunting but bottles a quietly churning rage, and it twists that dagger deeper with each new section it offers. The finale for "Exit Music (For a Film)" is like that bottled rage finally breaking through, igniting into a wall of distressed sound of the like the band's rarely tried since.

The final stretch of the album is also probably one of the all-time best closing runs: "Climbing Up the Walls" makes an orchestral section sound distressingly claustrophobic (it's phenomenal, by the way); the simple but endlessly beautiful "No Surprises" is the other big contender for the band's best song and in fact its quiet but powerful fragility is what converted me into thinking there's something to this band after all; "Lucky" is as atmospheric a rock anthem as the band would ever do and the second verse's introduction of the simple keyboard texture is one of my pet favourite moments of simple instrumental additions making a real difference; and "The Tourist" achingly floats in its own world, giving the paranoia of the album a calm breathe out in the end. OK Computer has throughout its length hit with some big punches and overall high quality miserablist rock, but it concludes like a real iconic moment in music history.

Furthermore, OK Computer still feels just as relevant as it always was as well, maybe even moreso in this modern society that's growing more cynical and fatigued by the month. It's just as evocative and its songs are still impactful, proving their strengths despite every single one of them having been picked to their bones over the years; including the "Fitter Happier" interlude, which genuinely has its own important slot in the overall flow and Greater Thematics of the album. OK Computer is a truly great album, often stunningly so, and very audibly a moment where a band realised their own capabilities towards greatness and made them a reality. That so many people in the world agree with me, a lot of them way more passionately than I do, is a happy coincidence. This is all to say that out of all the albums in my collection, OK Computer is probably the one record I find the most difficult to discuss, but you're in luck: in a matter of seconds you can find thousands of reviews, articles and in-depth essays that say what I'd likely think anyway. This must be what Beatles fans feel like.

It's not one of my personal all-time greats but its place among the canon is more than justified.

Rating: 9/10

Jason Lytle - Yours Truly, the Commuter (2009)

1) Yours Truly, the Commuter; 2) Brand New Sun; 3) The Ghost of My Old Dog; 4) I Am Lost (And the Moment Cannot Last); 5) Birds Encouraged Him; 6) It’s the Weekend; 7)  Fürget It; 8) This Song is the Mute Button; 9) Rollin’ Home Alone; 10) You’re Too Gone; 11) Flying Thru Canyons; 12) Here for Good

Grandaddy frontman's cosy homecoming. Familiar old Lytle territory, but comfortably so.

Key tracks: "Yours Truly, the Commuter", "Brand New Sun", "Flying Thru Canyons"

There’s only three years between Grandaddy’s then-last album Just Like the Fambly Cat and Jason Lytle’s solo debut Yours Truly, the Commuter, but Lytle gives the impression he’s returned from decades of wandering in the wilderness. The title track which opens the album is a proud declaration of return with a typically Lytle-esque self-deprecating angle (“I may be limping, but I’m coming home”), and that same feel of humble personal triumph runs throughout, in lyrics and mood. It’s like Lytle had not touched a single instrument during his break and now sounds delighted that he’s back at it again - and revelling in his own comeback romance. Or as the song puts it, “All work and no play might have done me in / But I’m stoked I’m back after where I’ve been”.

Given Grandaddy was always a Lytle solo job not-so-behind the scenes, Yours Truly, the Commuter slots in pretty comfortably as part of that lineage musically. All of Lytle’s traits from his songwriting style to his production style of choice are here exactly as they’ve always been, making Yours Truly, the Commuter instantly familiar to every Grandaddy fan - slightly more straightforward and more acoustic than fuzzy electric guitars, but largely as expected. What sets it apart as a Lytle solo record specifically is that it’s a lot less preoccupied of the world as a whole and it has shed off that weight off its back. If you could define Grandaddy by the lyrics addressing the balance between human nature and technology and the melancholic unease that seeped into the music through it, then Lytle “on his own” is just that: a singer/songwriter with little of the worries of the greater world behind him, focusing on whimsical character studies and mild introspection. It’s grounded and low stakes, and decidedly so.

If you need convincing that just Lytle’s charisma and his sharp earworm melodies alone without high concepts go a long way towards a good album, leading the album with its most boisterous songs drives that point across. The title track. the Grandaddy-esque “Brand New Sun” and jovially rolling “Ghost of My Old Dog” are all familiar Lytle territory but they charm you quickly, Lytle sounds reinvigorated and they make a good reminder for why more of Lytle’s songwriting is always nice to have around. Similarly, the album ends with a stretch of wistful ballads and mood pieces that could get really repetitive really quickly, but Lytle does bittersweet wonderfully and when combined with the general friendly warmth of the album, the last leg of the album is like a somber moment of reaching the final goal but reflecting on the journey behind. “Flying Thru Canyons” in particular is a disarmingly pretty credits roll and a little Lytle highlight. The only place where things get rolled a little too thin is  "It’s the Weekend", a peppy little number about the titular matter which is so lightweight it sounds intentionally throwaway. Between the understated grace of “Birds Encouraged Him” with its lovely, gently flowing synth melodies and the almost-instrumental “Fürget It”, it’s more of an eyebrow-raising interlude than a weekend party anthem.

The biggest real criticism you could throw at Yours Truly, the Commuter is that there’s no progress or major change included, that Lytle is simply continuing to use the same tricks he’s most familiar with: only the soundtrack-like “Fürget It” explores uncharted territories. But, and it gets very clear very quickly into the album, he’s not out to outdo his prior works with the album either. The red string that ties all the songs together is that sense of home-like coziness, and you can hear that achieving just that has been the primary goal for Lytle. Yours Truly the Commuter sets itself up as a homecoming album of sorts, a return to music from someone who needed to take a break from it for a while, and the album is loaded with that sense of rested positivity that comes from that. Even now, removed from its original comeback context through time, it has the aura of meeting up with an old friend you’ve not seen for a while and finding out he’s doing pretty decently for himself. It’s not a groundbreaking record by any means, but it’s one that simply feels good to listen to and to come back to from time to time.

Rating: 7/10

LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver (2007)

1) Get Innocuous!; 2) Time to Get Away; 3) North American Scum; 4) Someone Great; 5) All My Friends; 6) Us v Them; 7) Watch the Tapes; 8) Sound of Silver; 9) New York I Love You, But You’re Bringing Me Down

Houses some of the most essential LCD Soundsystem songs, but clearly the transitional period between rag-tag indie disco hits and more cohesive statements.

Key tracks: "North American Scum", "Someone Great", "All My Friends"

 A transitional step for LCD Soundsystem, and in hindsight a weird choice to raise as the band’s canonical classic considering how unfocused it is. Sound of Silver is the sound of James Murphy stretching his legs and beginning to realise his scope and ambitions as a songwriter, not content on simply churning out more witty indie disco jams in vein of the debut. The dance rock is still present and it’s the main flavour, but Sound of Silver is most characterised by Murphy’s big step into a more personal and serious style of songwriting, both lyrically and musically. The result is a mish-mash, a quilt built from wholly different cloths and one with some serious weighting issues. The bulk of the album is still pretty indebted to the debut but it’s the couple of off-curve serious moments - particularly the one-two punch of “Someone Great” and “All My Friends” - which steal the spotlight to such extent that the rest of the album is overshadowed in comparison.

Yet Sound of Silver still works, even if it’s not necessarily as immediate as the other LCD albums. The album may be the musical equivalent of throwing around things to which stick the most, but the songs that have made the cut are mostly composed of the band’s biggest classics. Ask any LCD fan for their top five songs and there’s a chance that Sound of Silver choices take up at least half of that list. Both “Someone Great” or “All My Friends” are frequently hailed as the band’s best song for a reason and it’s one piece of canon I have to agree with, because both the former’s synth melancholy and the latter’s ever-intensifying gut purge are giant songs that still seem personal to just you alone (the right answer is between the two is, of course, “All My Friends” - it’s one of the best songs of the decade, period). “North American Scum” is the archetypal example of a direct LCD rock song full of Murphy’s iconic wit, swagger and irony and it’s the best of its kind, the smokey fond farewell “New York I Love You…” has carved its own corner as the band’s single biggest tearjerker (especially after having become the set closer of their “last” concert) and the irresistable “Get Innocuous!” is the most grooving piece of music in the band’s repertoire with its Kraftwerk-bass and snappy rhythm. You could easily make an argument for “Us v Them” to belong on that list too: Murphy and co have always loved their long, tight jams that ebb and flow around a central groove, and “Us v Them” is a great, superbly fun example of that.

With that, you’ve got over half the album listed there, and each of those songs is genuinely an important part of the band’s history and legacy. It doesn’t matter if everything is a little all over the place when each of those songs are among the band’s most important and vital statements.

If it weren’t for the three other songs, I too would probably argue for this being the band’s best record. Not to slight on the songs given all three are thoroughly good, but they’re just completely overshadowed by everything else. “Watch the Tapes” and “Time to Get Away” are fun shorter cuts and the title track’s slowly enveloping mood manages to hit a particular soft spot in me, but all of them feel underwhelming in the company they’re in, and for most parts the other songs already do what they do, just better. On an album full of essentials they feel borderline unnecessary in comparison, a group of hanger-ons and retreads that could probably impress more under another setting but here there’s a huge gap between them and the rest.

It doesn’t change the fact that Sound of Silver is pretty much the most essential LCD Soundsystem record. It’s not their best and it certainly isn’t the most consistent, but so many of Murphy’s very greatest can be found here that it is, in some ways, the definitive experience - or at the very least, an excellent definition of LCD Soundsystem’s sound and why the group originally known just for their irreverent indie floor-fillers turned out to make a far great impact.

Rating: 8/10

Kirahvi nimeltä Tuike - Lehtipeitteen suojelijat (2010)

1) Lennon; 2) Vartija; 3) Kaikki pienet koirat; 4) KKAR; 5) Aleksanteri; 6) Tulikettu; 7) Askeleet rannalta; 8) Hurma; 9) Yö laulaa; 10) Vaapukkamehulaulu

Your favourite cartoon themes formed a band. Just as fun as it sounds.

Key tracks: "Lennon", "Kaikki pienet koirat", "Tulikettu"

If kick-ass cartoon theme tunes (think classic 80s US titles, or vintage anime) formed a band, you’d probably get Kirahvi nimeltä Tuike.

The fact that this concoction is a thing that a group of people decided to make their thing is a tad preposterous on its own, but the sheer conviction that Kirahvi nimeltä Tuike has for it is unbelievable. The music on Lehtipeitteen suojelijat is a rainbow explosion of glimmering keyboards and video game synths, the most obvious tie to any ‘real world’ music are hints towards the grand Nordic prog-pop traditions, and the lyrics are prosaic narrations about brave young heroes and their animal companions (or animal heroes) delivered in a verbose, storyteller-like fashion that’s not too far away from the kind of nutshell premise-laying so many animations start with. The band are called “A Giraffe Named Twinkle”, for crying out loud. But there’s no tongues lodged in cheeks, no wink and a nod that would hint at some sort of self-aware ridiculousness or trendy irony behind the scenes. Instead, the songs are delivered determinedly straight-faced. The themes are so over the top when in contrast to so much of other music out there but KTN’s unwavering belief in their own style lends it a sense of genuinety that gives it a foot on the ground. You can hear the it in the delivery too, and that makes the chosen direction all the more powerful. Fist-pump for the hero dogs, for the superhero foxes, for the plucky wanderers out to defeat evil.

KTN’s music is also obscenely bright and ludicrously glittery, in a way that I wouldn’t bark at anyone calling it cheesy, but the band’s approach to songwriting is to cover absolutely every ground with big melodies, and it’s a perfect bedfellow for the technicolour audio. It’s actually quite exciting: it’s a disarmingly charming approach, full of genuine giddiness that takes over, a ray sunshine filling the room from the speakers. And whilst they play these melodies in a very direct fashion, there’s an off-kilter sensibility that persists throughout the album and moves the verse-chorus-verse songs a little more off the beaten path. “Tulikettu” breaks into a synth-freakout right after a spoken word section that comes out of nowhere, “Kaikki pienet koirat” threatens to be a huge centerpiece but its choruses are surprisingly laidback in a really alluring fashion, and “Askeleet rannalta” takes a semi-synthpop approach which feels like the kind of natural band evolution we’d see a few albums on, making an early bird cameo. “Yö laulaa” is the culmination of this, bringing forth the prog-pop core closest to the surface as it ebbs and flows with its smooth, water-like melodies, closing with a sequence of shapeshifting instrumental sections which each sound more ambitious and exciting (and excited) than the last. When the band take it straight, their surprising influences make themselves known in the clearest way: “Lennon” genuinely feels like a theme song to a lost animation series, extended into a full-length anthem. It’s pulled off perfectly as well and a really intriguing thing to behold: and for someone like me who has had a fair number of cartoon-related songs all over my hard drive, it hits those vibes excellently.

The lyrics do play some role to it. Kirahvi nimeltä Tuike are creating their own mythos here - a pantheon of heroes of all sizes and fur coats and a lot of giraffes - and the band sing their tales like they were honoured anthems, with a stylistic earnestness and directness of any great opening theme that needs to hook you in straight away while still clearly introducing each character. They form a huge part of the album’s own personality as well, being deeply tied to the very concept of the band. As such, there is a certain kind of language barrier here that has made KTN an awkward album to recommend, because when so much of the album’s charm is based on its curious lyrical themes and they’re all delivered in obscure moonspeak, part of the record is bound to get lost in translation for many. Fortunately though, Lehtipeitteen suojelijat is rather fun just on purely musical terms as well. The obvious infectiousness of the hooks is one thing, but there’s a good deal of really good playing and very neat ideas from a purely musical standpoint here, too: an arrangement and instrumental know-how which are present throughout the album underneath the vocals, from the charming retro game synths to the brilliant bass lines gliding beneath every song. There’s a couple of full instrumentals punctuating the tracklist too to prove a point, even if their place on the album is more to support the rest of the tracklist. The interlude-esque “KKAR” demonstrates that the band do not necessarily need the vocals and lyrical material to create something distinct, with the band’s obvious video game soundtrack inspirations coming to surface the most. “Vaapukkamehulaulu” on the other hand surprises with a moody post-rock vibe that tucks the album into bed with a suddenly dramatic swerve and demonstrates that there’s more than one trick to KTN. Both give a larger spotlight to the actual musical side of the band and while they’re not as in-your-face as the album’s main songs, they do show off elements that otherwise might get a little more lost under the vocals, or in the case of the latter a side of the band we haven’t seen before.

Sadly Lehtipeitteen suojelijat seems to have been the only proper album KTN ever released, with the band largely vanishing beyond some internet freebies in the following years. It’s a shame. I readily admit that my overall musical knowledge is more the breadth of a comfortably sized lake than even the tiniest ocean, but the lyrics and music combined quite unlike anything I’ve come across from an artist without a TV or game tie-in. That’s commendable - four young guys from Finland creating something unique and truly their own, and backing it up with a set of superb songs full of heart.

Rating: 8/10

Kent - Kent (1995)

1) Blåjeans; 2) Som vatten; 3) Ingenting någonsin; 4) När det blåser på månen; 5) Jag vill inte vara rädd; 6) Vad två öron klarar; 7) Den osynlige mannen; 8) Pojken med hålet i händen; 9) Ingen kommer att tro dig; 10) Stenbrott; 11) Frank

Cookie-cutter inexperienced rock band debut album from the 90s. Flaws and charms in its guitar wall melancholy.

Key tracks: "Blåjeans", "När det blåser på månen", "Stenbrott"

Kent were quite inarguably one of the biggest success stories the Nordic region has had. Dubbed “Sweden’s biggest rock band”, they’ve been paving their own way to great effect and achieved largely anything a band of their kind could hope for: international hits, constant critical acclaim, no particular flops worth a mention, managing to turn a b-side into a pseudo-hit, going through a full sound reinvention and pulling it off perfectly, and finally settling down by steadily releasing consistently good albums after the radio hits died down - all done with the sort of complete creative independence a lot of bands of their stature have had to fight for. It’s good to mention their future for the sake of context and getting the grasp of just how far they’ve come, because on their debut we’re dealing with none of the above. In 1995 Kent were a group of young guys escaping the mundanity of their small town life by playing music and who had barely just settled on a line-up and a name when they were signed up.

Based on just that, you can kind of guess where this is going. Kent is spirited, impassioned, and so indebted to the moody, post-grunge British rock scene of the 90s that you’d only need to switch the sung tongue and it’d be right at home. Kent make their entrance with the way and the sound that hundreds of young bands just like them started their journey with during the time period - moody, dour and propelled by quiet/loud dynamics, with echoes of Manic Street Preachers, early Radiohead (The Bends was released almost exactly on the same day as Kent, fun fact) and other contemporaries. The band members were in their mid-twenties when the album was released but it’s a hotbed of all the teenage anxiety they had been bottling for years, and Joakim Berg’s inexperienced voice barely holds itself together. There’s not a lick of originality present, but there is plenty of passion and Berg’s charisma is already starting to bubble through. At times, it’s the only thing really carrying the songs.

Like a lot of the albums of this kind, Kent as well is little more than just a launchpad. I mentioned before that Kent haven’t had any real failures in their lifetime and I stand by that, but it’s really obvious the band were still completely green at this stage despite years of active grassroots activity. They play well enough but the songs themselves lack depth, coming off as decent enough to listen to but rather nondescript when it comes down to leaving an impression. The best cuts - “Blåjeans”, “När det blåser på månen”, “Stenbrott” - wouldn’t be the highlights they are if they were on any other album and even their memorability is partially based on silly little details; “Blåjeans” sticks in your head because of its placement as the first ever Kent track sequentially, “När det blåser på månen” has a hilariously melodramatic lift-off countdown by its end and the abrupt guitar lick in the chorus of “Stenbrott” is a thoroughly daft but efficiently memorable hook. This isn’t meant to be a backhanded compliment or a dig at the other songs because the album does get the bare minimum of foot-tapping, head-nodding approval rating at the very least, but the album’s overall generic nature is undeniable and the songs aren’t so great it’d be easy to ignore.

That said, the best thing that the album has going for it is in fact that typical 90s sound - it’s definitely a heavy load completely subjective and unashamedly personal associations talking, but the little touch of nostalgic warmth that the dry 90s rock sound brings is probably just as, if not even more crucial to the overall enjoyment it brings than the actual songs are. But as far as any real merit or general importance goes, Kent doesn’t have much of it. Its main talking point is that it’s Kent’s debut album and in all likelihood, without that connection it would probably be lost in time completely, filed along with countless others of its kind. There’s no hidden deep cuts or a random hit song equivalent to the “Creep” scenario to keep it in general consciousness - it’s just five guys with guitars and drums and a will to make something more out of life. That gets them somewhere, at least, but Kent’s debut is quite obviously the weakest thing they’ve done.

Rating: 5/10

John Frusciante - Shadows Collide with People (2004)

1) Carvel; 2) Omission; 3) Regret; 4) Ricky; 5) Second Walk; 6) Every Person; 7) -00Ghost27; 8) Wednesday's Song; 9) This Cold; 10) Failure33 Object; 11) Song to Sing When I'm Lonely; 12) Time Goes Back; 13) In Relief; 14) Water; 15) Cut-Out; 16) Chances; 17) 23 Go in to End; 18) The Slaughter

What Frusciante sounds like when he sets out to make his own big-budget recording. Don't worry about this being stifled by overproduction though; if anything, this is a prime example of how to use the studio space correctly and create your masterpiece.

Key tracks: "Carvel", "Omission", "Time Goes Back"

A persistent characteristic throughout John Frusciante's solo recordings is how modest they are. In contrast to his time with the Chili Peppers and the extensively labored, expensively produced album sessions spent at top-of-the-line studios, Frusciante's own albums have mostly been recorded at home and with only a few additional names in the credits lists. Shadows Collide with People is, to date, the first out of only two exceptions, and it's the major one. It's a big budget, hi-fi experience meticulously recorded in a professional studio; a self-admitted response to anyone who called Frusciante's prior recordings unfinished or messy, going all the way to prove he could do the opposite if he wanted to.

Shadows Collide with People introduces its densely constructed sound right off the bat. Every note played and every sound made has been treated with pristine perfection, there's layers upon layers of vocal melodies and guitars that would make it impossible to accurately replicate it live, and the majority of the tracks are amplified by prominent keyboard and synthesizer parts. Considering the timing, it's easy to see Shadows Collide with People as Frusciante's personal counterpart of his then-band's By the Way, released a few years prior and in itself a melody-rich and studio-heavy album that was heavily weighted towards Frusciante's contributions, featuring many of the same musical cues that Shadows is full of. Familiar Peppers names even feature here, with Chad Smith powerhousing the drums on each song and Flea making a surprisingly understated appearance in "The Slaughter", and with frequent brother-in-arms and future Peppers guitarist Josh Klinghoffer having an audible backing role across the tracklist. But where By the Way was rather blunt dynamically, Frusciante himself helms the producer's seat on Shadows and ensures that the sound world isn't an overproduced and overstuffed mess, and rather each element is given its own space. It's a rich and warm sound, both when filling the room out loud and when intimately observed via headphones. Shadows Collide with People sounds gorgeous, and a great deal of effort has been put forward to make it so without sacrificing anything.

The production values of Shadows are especially noteworthy not just because of the sound itself and its contrast against the rest of Frusciante's discography, but the (possibly coincidental) effect they have had on Frusciante's songwriting as a whole. With the clear sound, the ability to layer multiple elements precisely and the piece-by-piece recording process, Frusciante approaches the songs with the mindset of having all that utility in hand and makes use of it in the song arrangements in a practically liberating way. The songs were written with these possibilities in mind and designed to use all those elements to their advantage, building upon their already-strong core melodies with frequent multi-tracked backing vocals, several guitar parts trading spaces and keyboard textures that are like punctuation or font changes for the thoughts and emotions the songs wish to raise. It's that interesting, and in this case often beautiful, point where the songwriting and the production hold hands so well that they both support one another, and reach to the listener all the more strongly because of their collaboration.

That freedom of possibility brings out two things. One, Shadows is Frusciante's most openly joyous album. Many of its songs could be called downright anthems, Frusciante bellows out the abstract but appropriately scene-setting lyrics with complete conviction and major chords are everywhere. Frusciante's physical and mental rehabilitation post-coming clean is a big part of the man's mythology, but that newfound appreciation for life is the most apparent here, still relatively recent after the recovery: it leads to the passion evident in the performance and the lyrics frequently referencing learning from life's mistakes. This then leads to a kind of positive boundlessness for the album, expressed through Frusciante indulging himself with big choruses, dramatic musical explosions, grand swoons and other notions that might be a bit too 'obvious' and bombastic for your average Frusciante home recording - which, while not experimental most of the time, have their own sense of song structures and lack of reliance for any of the above.

But here you have "Carvel" opening the album with a proper bang after its bubbly intro and sounding colossal from the get-go, only becoming more towering as it goes on and Frusciante keeps dialing up its rock anthem intensity. It's all giant guitar walls, fist-pumping sing-alongs and sort-of-choruses, and it's while unusual to hear Frusciante play something so bold and powerfully direct under his own name, it's near-empowering to hear it: "Carvel" is a phenomenal song that constantly one-ups itself with another section more awesome than the prior one. Meanwhile "Song to Sing When I'm Lonely" and "Wednesday's Song" are two of Frusciante's most straightforward pop songs, and they're both disarming in their sheer melodic wonder - they're the sound of summers and life at its most colourful, brought through a warm sound and rich tune. While the tricks they employ aren't new to Frusciante, the unashamed openness of them has been rarer in his back catalogue.

Behind the production and the structural choices, the songs of Shadows Collide with People are consistently strong. Each of the actual songs offers something new, has the power to stay with you long after the album has finished and strongly resonates even within the greater context of Frusciante's whole discography. That's staggering on its own, but even the interludes (the ones with all the number titles, representing various milestone ages for Frusciante) all feel absolutely crucial to the album's flow - in fact, the hauntingly atmospheric ambient cut "23 Go in to End" is one of the album's big stand-outs, a veil of dreamy sound covering the world in a particularly poignant way. Out the "proper" songs, many - "Carvel", "Wednesday's Song", the achingly lovely Klinghoffer duet "Omission" and the bittersweet beauty of "Ricky" - are among the best within Frusciante's discography. Even "Regret", built entirely on two repeated lines and a couple of similarly recurring melodies, is an impressive example of how the same passage can be wholly different when the production behind them changes and grows, from downbeaten to defiant; it's the underdog that unexpectedly reaches the goal far more impressively than you'd expect. And while much of Shadows'  strength comes from its more delicate moments, it can also be physically powerful when it wants. Smith's drumming, here in its peak strength, injects the songs with a thunderous energy which especially makes the more guitar-heavy rock-out moments even wilder, whether contributing to the majesty of "Carvel" or powering through the brief but punchy "Second Walk", which is downright breath-taking in its sheer speed and in-your-face melodies (particularly when Frusciante bring out the sparkling guitar part towards the end). 

But the light that shines the brightest is "Time Goes Back". It's a marvellously effortless and staggeringly beautiful song that doesn't brag with complex arrangements or intricate structures, but Frusciante's delivery is phenomenal and makes the song sound so effortlessly majestic. It's where many of Shadows' traits all come together to reach the peak: it's blissfully lovely and larger-than-life in its power, melodically rich and thoroughly resonating. Other songs on the album may arguably be more ambitious or more upfront, but "Time Goes Back" hits a special nerve simply by how its delivered. It could just well my favourite moment Frusciante has committed on tape; or so it at least feels every time it reaches its heights and feels like a revelatory moment for the power of music.

That notion is where that top rating comes from. Over the course of this review it may have become apparent that Shadows Collide with People often whelms me, repeatedly and throughout over the course of is duration, and in a way that feels like the first time, every time. As a John Frusciante album it's the strange one. It bears little similarity with anything else the man has released under his own name, both in songwriting and especially the sound. But it simultaneously showcases the best sides of Frusciante in the clearest way: his vocals, his detailed arrangements, his style of guitar playing, and how Frusciante brings those elements out on this record is sublime, often perfect. It's not that the big production makes Shadows stronger than his other albums, it's that the production has taken Frusciante down to a path where he can really show off those ideas. He immerses into the songwriting so well that you can hear the love and devotion he has for his craft that he's famously obsessed about. When an artist puts so much of themselves into something, the excitement becomes a tangible part of what comes out from the speakers and resonates through the listener. It's a series of moments that take one aback with the impact of a gut punch; and once the album has finished, there's that curious, almost physical feeling of the world feeling a little different after going through all that splendour. It's the embarrassingly subjective hallmark of an all-time favourite album.

Take that particular super-subjectivity away and you're still left with an incredible landmark album for Frusciante. It doesn't overshadow the rest of Frusciante's works and I don't hold their more home-knit nature against them in comparison, but if you want the best possible idea as to why Frusciante is a noteworthy artist on his own right, this holds all the tricks.

Rating: 10/10

Kemopetrol - Everything’s Fine (2002)

1) Goodbye; 2) Saw It on TV; 3) For Nothing; 4) Shine; 5) Everything that Surrounds Us; 6) Windmills; 7) Hypno Eyes; 8) Forest for the Trees; 9) Everything Under Control; 10) Everything’s Fine

The move from the debut's freshness towards slicker and more radio-friendly waters begins.

Key tracks: "Goodbye", "Windmills", "Everything Under Control"

Not to be too melodramatic about it but it’s Kemopetrol’s second album and it’s the end of them as they were. The start of something different as well, though.

Slowed Down, the band’s debut, sounded a little out of sync with everything else that was going on in Finland at the time. The general mainstream state was that of flux: the millennial shift times were characterised by the Finnish indie rock scene starting to find its feet underground, while the radio play belonged to groups trying their hands at adapting American and British mainstream approaches for a Finnish taste. Kemopetrol’s chilled out, daydreaming bedroom indie pop was something completely different. But the Finnish mainstream has a habit of adopting outsiders with a very open mind: primary examples include the mainstreamification of metal to the point of making Christmas and children’s versions of it, and how the country managed to turn the combination of reggae and Finnish folk music into a legitimate commercial trend. So Slowed Down became a hit and slowly started shaping the scene sound in its own way. And that’s where we come to Everything’s Fine, the second album.

It’s either a case of the mainstream adapting to Kemopetrol pretty heavily or Kemopetrol deciding to go on a more commercial route, but there’s a definite transitional transformation going on with the band’s second album. It’s slick, punchy and polished – the homely musicians have suddenly turned into radio superstars. This happened without warning: normally a development like this would take a couple of albums and a few careful toe-dips in the water before fully diving in, but as soon as the sharp, slick futuro-disco of “Goodbye” reveals itself it’s clear the band have gone through a reinvention. They’re shiny, painfully cool and painfully hip with the times. They’ve lost some of their original charm and have started on the road they’d walk for the next few albums (ie most of their active duration) as relative mainstream darlings.

Not inherently bad when you’ve got the songs to back it up, which Kemopetrol do. In addition, Everything’s Fine is a little bit of a transitional effort even if at first it seems like it’s loaded with just the suave hits. All the singles are loaded right up the front: the pounding “Goodbye”, the glitzy “Saw It on TV” that might as well be Finnish pop/rock of the early 00s in a nutshell, the name-appropriate “Shine” and the lightly rocking “For Nothing” (which wasn’t a single per se but still got some air play). They’re all fine tunes for most parts: “Goodbye” in particular is pretty excellent despite its anaemic and thoroughly pointless guitar solo. But once the initial hit wave has gone Everything’s Fine reveals its best parts by showing some different sides. “Everything that Surrounds Us”, “Everything’s Fine” and “Forest for the Trees” are all minimal piano driven pieces but each one approaches the formula differently: “Everything that Surrounds Us” swivels around intimately, the title track is a late night mood piece and “Forest for the Trees” adds a little beat to the backbone and is a surprisingly affective song despite being a glaringly simple and straightforward mid-tempo rocker. “Hypno Eyes” brings a sudden bit of tight groove into the mix, being led by a hypnotically thumping rhythm in some dark disco somewhere.

The most inspired are the last remaining tracks. “Everything Under Control” is bombastic and dramatic, almost aggressive - and in a fashion that suits the band better than the debut’s sudden forays into hard rock riffs. Instead, the song is driven by a simple piano melody, a swivelling accordion and a hoover (!) and it grows into colossal heights you would’ve never suspected from such a band who normally tends to stay grounded. “Windmills” is even better. The accordion is back, this time floating weightlessly around the airy production, and it meets with a dreamy chorus and Charlie’s Angels melodies, mixing into a daydream of a pop song. It also feels like the closest tie to the atmosphere set by Slowed Down (make of that what you will).

The sequencing is so that Everything’s Fine is a little bit of an album of two (almost) halves. The first half re-introduces Kemopetrol as a genuine mainstream force, then the second half applies the same production tricks to a group of songs more reminiscent of the first album. First re-invention, then natural evolution. If you want to be cruel about it, this is somewhat the end of Kemopetrol at their most original as the subsequent albums would see the band walking well-worn paths after others. At this stage though they still had enough of their own to lead rather than follow. Everything’s Fine is definitely not as timeless as Slowed Down but it still plays out strong, in particular during the second half that has aged very gracefully. It’s a little sad it doesn’t quite follow in the debut’s steps, especially since whenever it does it’s at its best, but time has definitely showed this to be a better follow-up than initially thought. Kemopetrol wouldn’t be the same band they were on the debut ever again, but here they’re still playing up to their strengths.

Rating: 7/10

Kemopetrol - Slowed Down (2000)

1) Tomorrow; 2) African Air; 3) Child Is My Name; 4) Night After Night; 5) View from the Sea; 6) Drown Little Child; 7) Teeth; 8) Disbelief; 9) Slowed Down; 10) Without Listening

Fresh, exciting, wonderfully melodic. A classic, scene-setting debut.

Key tracks: "Tomorrow", "Child Is My Name", "Disbelief"

The late 90s were a fertile breeding ground for brand new Finnish talent. Maybe it was something in the water or maybe it was the influence from what was happening in the UK and the US breaking through to the Nordic consciousness, but it suddenly felt like anything was possible and the groundroots music scene started bursting with new names taking lessons from English-language rock and adapting the sound into the Finnish mindset. It was mostly bubbling under the mainstream of course – lots of critical acclaim and countless small names becoming cult classics overnight to be treasured forevermore in scene-centric box sets, but no real presence on the airwaves over the more experienced, foreign peers. Which was fine; it gave the scene a chance to develop without pressure and grow slowly through the internet and music shows on small-time cable channels.

When they first debuted, Kemopetrol sounded completely unique to the Finnish landscape and in retrospect, can comfortably be attributed to be the icebreaker in charge of the new wave of Finnish music about to take over by storm in the 00s. In the grand scheme of things they hadn’t developed anything unique – their debut Slowed Down is so early 00s zeitgeisty in its sound – but they had two very strong feats of their own: one, they were Finnish and two, they actually broke into public consciousness big-time. You could hear them on the radio with their legitimate hits, you could hear them on the TV with their music licensed to advertisements, you could actually see their name in the headlines. They spearheaded the movement breaking new ground and while I’m sure it would have happened later on anyway through other means, I genuinely attribute Kemopetrol with not only helping Finnish indie to become popular, but also helping to shape the sound of Finnish pop music in the new millennium. There’s a direct line starting from here and going through a range of acts from indie darlings like Husky Rescue to latter-day mainstream pop such as Chisu.

Slowed Down, then, is a bit of classic record. It’s not just a famous in its general cultural relevance as described above, but it’s also somewhat of a magnum opus for the band themselves. It didn’t have the biggest mainstream impact out of the band’s albums (that award goes to the follow-up Everything’s Fine) and there’s something noteworthy to say about the band’s ability to change and re-invent themselves a number of times later on, but it’s here where the biggest impact lies. To wit, it has “Child Is My Name”: the band’s inarguable signature tune, the song that got them recognised in the first place and a cut that still remains remarkably captivating to the point of never failing to seize the attention when it plays. It’s a perfect match of an outstanding melody that feels huge without ever directly actually sounding so, a killer bass riff, a deep production that gives them both an otherwordly tone and a set of suitably vague lyrics that probably sound deeper than what they actually are, but which suit the tone of the music spectacularly. It is, in itself, one of those songs that make the album it resides in worth a mention. It also doesn’t even begin to describe what the album itself actually is.

Slowed Down is very much a mongrel album – a mixture of sounds so apart from eachother that it would be bafflingly bizarre if not for the fact that somehow, somehow, Kemopetrol actually managed to marry them together. The ten songs scatter between Britpop both at its breeziest and most upbeat as well as its angriest and angstiest while taking a dip down in dub and making eye contact with trip-hop, eventually finishing the album in a happy-dappy rave-out because why the hell not at this point. It’s sometimes a little jarring – the metal-riffic “Drown Little Girl” as a prime example – but to their credit the band make it work. A large part of this is due to the production. While the songs may come from altogether different places, they’re all treated the same sonically and the same rules are applied to each of them. It helps to tie down the songs and make it feel like they belong together, showing off Kemopetrol as a band who simply have a wide range of influences rather than one that haphazardly aims everywhere in confusion. There’s of course singer Laura Närhi’s voice too. She doesn’t have the strongest set of pipes but her tone is perfect for the music and she never really alters it across the album, which once again acts as a binding glue rather than as a flaw. There’s a bit of a Finnish twang to it but it’s strangely charming in its own right.

Each of the ten songs also stand out, partially obviously because of how different they sound but also in terms of sheer songwriting. There’s that cliché about bands having a lifetime to perfect their debuts and being able to capture themselves at their purest in their first releases, and it’s a cliché I have an aversion towards for a number of reasons, but there’s a hint of truth to it and it’s albums like Slowed Down that make a good case for it. Each song in Slowed Down is not only really solid as tunes but they all have a certain ambition and energy to them that could only come from a young band wanting to take on the world and not knowing any better. Each song acts as a bit of a mini-statement of its own, whether it’s the pop/rock could-be-hits ready to conquer the radiowaves (“Tomorrow”, “Night After Night”), the deeper, more atmospheric cuts (“Slowed Down”, “Teeth”, “African Air”) or the parts where it’s incredibly obvious that someone was listening to a lot of British rock music in the late 90s (“View from the Sea”, “Drown Little Girl”).  They all want to captivate the listener completely as much as the last song tried to, attempting to build new worlds from scratch every time the track number switches to the next. Most of the album succeeds in it pretty well – it’s all damn good music and while the style-hopping can cause some of the tracks to get buried in the chaos for a while, it’s never for good. For all its varied sounds, Slowed Down is tight.

What actually edges the album from great to classic are three cuts in particular. “Child Is My Name” we’ve already talked about but it’s worth an essay in itself if one were so inclined and definitely at least deserves another direction mention here. “Without Listening” is a tour-de-force closer that finishes the album in a way that it deserves: by making absolutely no sense compared to anything that came before, with its space discoteque vibe bearing no resemblance to anything else here, but sounding so exuberant and passionately joyous that it’s clear the band were having the time of their lives when they were given a chance to record their music. Then there’s “Disbelief” – quite possibly the best thing Kemopetrol have ever committed to tape, no matter how brilliant “Child Is My Name” is. It’s a five-minute trip through hazily dreamy soundscapes, pop perfection melodies, soaringly spacey guitars and bursts of energy that break through the dreaminess and take the song to warp speed. It’s a huge song that starts so benignly but ends up somewhere completely different: a proper journey encapsulated into a pop song. It’s special, genuinely special. Where the rest of the album is a strong collection of songs on its own, it’s these three songs that really make the case why Kemopetrol were the ones to make an impact in the larger scale: you needed a band who were able to tap into something special like this to be able to reach out.

And reach out they did, both to the general audience and to myself, and Slowed Down still continues to do so. It’s definitely an album very tied down to what the music world was up to at the turn of the millennium, almost like acting as the marriage between the British strain of pop/rock that was everywhere at the time and the downtempo atmospherics that would soon begin their climb to relevance. But it’s not aged in the slightest and if anything, the time between then and now has only made it more obvious that the album’s success was due to its great songs, not because of any particular external factors. There’s also the context that comes from knowing the rest of Kemopetrol’s journey. While the nature of those albums will be tackled on their in their own reviews, the gist is that the band became more precise and polished in their execution with time and while that’s not a bad trait in itself by any means, a part of why Slowed Down sounds a little bit more special is because it’s still a bit aloof and imprecise: there’s a type of untamed nature to it that gives it life, the backbone of the music being the still-youthful energy of a young band unafraid and eager. It has character. Combine it with the songwriting and the sound, and even when you strip away all the contextual and cultural bobbins the underlining message is clear: Slowed Down is a great, varied and inspired album that would’ve been a landmark release even if it had stayed bubbling under in its own scene.

Rating: 9/10

Anssi Kela - Nummela (2001)

1) Kaksi sisarta; 2) Mikan faijan BMW; 3) Esko Riihelän painajainen; 4) Puistossa (feat. Alexandra); 5) Kaunotar ja basisti; 6) Rva Ruusunen; 7) Harhaa (feat. Anna Kuoppamäki); 8) Kissanpäivät; 9) Nummela

Under the incredibly of-its-time production there's a classic singer/songwriter storyteller's album, by a man who needed to get the songs out of his system. And then he took over the world around him with them.

Key tracks: "Kaksi sisarta", "Mikan faijan BMW", "Nummela"

Every now and then an album arrives that takes over the entire world or the country you live in. For some time, it's the biggest thing there is - it dominates the airwaves and the charts, it breaks records and it's heard by absolutely everyone and they all have an opinion on it. The Marshall Matters LPs, the 21s, the Neverminds. In the early 00s, singer/songwriter Anssi Kela's debut Nummela became the biggest thing in Finland. You couldn't escape from its songs on radio or TV, it sold insane amounts and broke several sales records, and everyone knew it - everyone, from young kids to your grandma. Kela's music broke barriers and was loved by everyone regardless of age or music taste, and those who didn't enjoy its omnipresence made sure they were ready to mention it whenever required, with the requisite defenses and reasons for their contrary opinion.

The secret to Kela's success wasn't a mysterious one: he simply made his music incredibly approachable to everyone. The basis of his sound was in the great, classic singer/songwriter tradition. He's a storyteller by nature, filling his lyrics with relatable or otherwise understandable stories of everyday people and their joys and tragedies (a direct quote from someone older than me at the time, it was "lovely to hear someone sing about actual things"). The core of the music itself was in your traditional man-and-guitar vein, but decorated with a slick, modern production and appropriate fashionable (at the time) touch in its sounds: a combination of both new and old in exactly the right amounts. Kela had a seemingly divine gift for a really great hook and it was impossible to get his songs out of your head once they made their way there, and all those hooks and melodies were so perfectly hummable and singable and repeatable. Kela himself was a charmer as well. A softly husky, pleasant voice, reasonably charismatic looks and a background that was equally humble and legendary, tragic and inspirational: he was a small town kid (this album itself is titled after the said town) who came from a line of town-famous musicians who all died before their age, leaving the rest of his close family in a rather chaotic state, but who overcame the hardships and climbed to the top. Considering that pictures of his dead father and grandfather are included in the album booklet, it's not like any of this was being kept particularly quiet either.

In short, Kela was a humongous success because he was destined to be so. Everything in his music or character almost seemed to be designed to win everyone's hearts, but genuine charm and realness radiated from him to the extent that you could never have been cynical over him. He was a lovely guy who wrote fantastically catchy songs, and then proceeded to dominate the whole country through that simple formula.

But there's still something special within Nummela itself. Kela has been steadily releasing albums throughout the past decade but nothing has come even close to the eyesight of his mega-selling debut; actual hit singles beyond the ones taken from Nummela number in exactly two (until a sudden career resurrection no one expected over a decade after), and they're the ones that directly followed Nummela (one of them so closely that it was included in the deluxe re-release of the album). Nummela, then, clearly carries a special magic that continues to make it a rewarding listen in a way his other albums do not.

It all somewhat boils down to his personal history. The photos of his lost family members weren't in the booklet because the record label wanted to build a mythology and a backstory: they're there because Kela's legacy and personal history fueled the album itself. The title track outright says it so - located at the end of the album, it's the only song where Kela stops telling stories about other people and sits down to talk about his own story. The song feels like a confessional, bittersweet excerpts of life's ups and downs that eventually cause Kela to follow his family bloodline and commit his feelings on tape. The song is the album's masterpiece and while it's the only one that's outright about the writer himself, that personal touch flows through the other eight songs. While the character names and situations in each song are different to Kela's own, each one feels like it stems from a real place and from personal experiences. Naming the album after his hometown and paying tribute to his family tree both signify that the music in Nummela comes from the heart, that it's been fueled by the artist's blood, sweat and tears as he's worked on the songs day and night as if he was possessed by the need to let them out. Often it manifests in a notable emotional load on the shoulders of the songs, like with the genuine happiness found when your life hits that one perfect moment in "Kaunotar ja basisti" and the painful nostalgia for the innocent days of youth that looms over "Kissanpäivät". The whole of Nummela has that incredibly precious feeling of genuine emotional presence that we often associate with artists' most personal records, only this time the lyrics mostly avoid anything directly personal and the music is in the guise of somewhat slickly-produced pop/rock rather than lo-fi acoustic escapism or dark atmospherics.

Which is fine - it's clearly the place where Kela feels most comfortable to be in and it results in a group of excellent songs that allow his knack for a great melody and hook to shine, sometimes literally as the production really lets each note play out clearly. On the other hand, at times the album's rather dare-I-say commercial sheen and modern production result in a somewhat more dated sound. You couldn't get much more 2001 than the record scratches, drum samples and effects on "Mikan faijan BMW" and "Puistossa" (perhaps unsurprisingly the album's two biggest hits), but if you were there at the time it's less like unearthing ancient artifacts and has a far more pleasant, nostalgically warm feel to it. The songs themselves are great though, and in particular "Mikan faijan BMW" has stood time incredibly: its wistfulness and pathos can get a bit heavy-handed, but Kela manages to make it scarily relatable and the highly sing-alongy chorus sounds like a classic already canonised in pop culture songbooks from the very first time it hits your ears and likely lodges into your head forever. "Puistossa" is like the little brother to "Mikan faijan BMW" in tone, style and tragedy, and its folk-meets-hip-hop stylings are the most dated in the album, but Kela manages to whip up hooks so strong it's really hard not to get captivated by it.

Huge debut albums are almost always a curse for their artists and Kela couldn't escape that either. He's continued to write catchy choruses and tell bittersweet stories of everyday people, but none of the subsequent albums have carried the same spark as Nummela. It's clearly an album that took a great deal of personal motivation to come out and once he had found a release for that emotional energy, his music took a turn towards your standard sort of singer/songwriter rocker material. Nummela is his apex point as a songwriter, a collection of nine incredibly catchy pop songs filtered through a greater desire that became such a strong concoction it took an entire country by storm.

Rating: 8/10

Hot Chip - Coming on Strong (2004)

1) Take Care; 2) The Beach Party; 3) Keep Fallin’; 4) Playboy; 5) Crap Kraft Dinner; 6) Down with Prince; 7) Bad Luck; 8) You Ride, We Ride, in My Ride; 9) Shining Escalade; 10) Baby Said; 11) One One One 

Geek r'n'b. All you need to know.

Key tracks: "Playboy", "Crap Kraft Dinner", "Baby Said"

As far as first impressions go, this has got to be one of the more surreal ones. Early Hot Chip in general had a bit of a bizarre feel to them, given the band were intentionally playing up to the “wise-ass nerd romantics” image they had and a result stood out from the crowd by emphasising their complete non-machoness. But Coming on Strong is still a surreal album even coming from that context, especially as a debut album. Imagine a group of pasty white nerds having grown up on gangsta rap and smooth R'n'B, using these as a thematic launchpad for their bedroom music experiments while simultaneously being both earnest about it and, realising the inherent absurdity of it, taking the mick out of themselves and the concept. Here we have Alexis Taylor getting sick of motherfuckers and jerk-off losers with his frail falsetto and Joe Goddard longing for his boo and trying to act like the coolest guy in the hood while he’s rolling around in his twenty-inch rimmed car, while the music straddles a thin line between oddball, off-kilter amateur experiments and genuinely soulful, emotional songwriting.

Arguably Coming on Strong’s sound is a more significant reason to listen to it than the actual songs, because its sonic thematics are its most distinguishable feature. The tone of the album is part decidedly quirky and part early uncertainty on where to go and how to get there. The latter is even more detectable in the actual songs themselves: Hot Chip were still testing waters at this point in that department and it’s pretty clear even from a cursory look. It’s probably better to talk about Coming on Strong as a series of rather good moments separated by a lot of very similar low-key, home-spun mid-tempo synth pop. It’s not without its charms but it is without any major hooking points, especially for anyone coming into the album after the rather hook-tastic later albums. The album tries a lot – most songs will have some sort of focal musical part that nests in your head if you give it a chance – but rarely succeeds to the level that you’d start thinking its main draw is in its songs rather than the gangsta nerd ambience.

But Coming on Strong isn’t without its more complete merits. The lead (and only) single “Playboy” more or less sums up the entire album within its five and a half minutes: you’ll get the moody minimalist beats, Taylor’s quiet whispering and the bonkers swagger bragger ‘tude all over the album, but here they’re all together and in the best form as they’ll get, almost as if this song came before everything else and the band then decided to extend the idea for an entire album. On the whole other end is “Baby Said” which, conveniently for a song so near the end of the album, links the Hot Chip here to what would come next. It’s lighter and airier than anything else here, with a catchy pop singalong finale where the band suddenly stumble onto the makings of what would inspire a good chunk of the rest of their career. “Crap Kraft Dinner”, the best song on the album, is on the other hand simply a really good tune. It drops the pretense and roleplay completely and goes in a strikingly more wistful direction, properly debuting the band’s trademark soulfulness and revealing their heart. It’s a simple song, consisting of two halves made up of repeating the same part over and over again, but both parts are excellent in their own right and combined they form a heart-grasper of a song. Under its off-kilter name lies a sublime thing of beauty.

Those three songs are the musical anchor points that Coming on Strong relies on. While some of the rest of its songs are better than others (“Down With Prince” and the dance anthem lite “You Ride, We Ride, in My Ride” have a certain quirky groove to them that raises the bar slightly), the disappointing truth is that Coming on Strong is more a strong curio than a strong album. It’s arguably far better if you come to it with the hindsight of someone who’s already familiar with the rest of the discography – the added knowledge of what the group really are like allows you to enjoy the oddness without thinking this is all there is to the group’s music, and makes it doubly so fascinating and endearing. But remove it from its context and it’s even less noteworthy than with the safety net of the band’s history underneath it. I’ll be the first one to admit that it’s still an enjoyable thing to listen through, but at the end of the day the songs pale in comparison to what anyone’s come to expect from Hot Chip.

Rating: 6/10