NEW BUNNYMEN ALBUM

[fat cherry]

my inner fanboy is tellingme to listen to them all and work it out. MOstly flowers I think, but could be wrong. it could be a long day.

[Dr Cheese]

As bored as I am at work and with Ipod readily to hand I really couldn't be arsed, life's too short!

It is annoying though when you hear a familiar melody pop up and can't think what it's from, I'll expect a full report from you in due course.

[fat cherry]

reminds me of a thread a while back (and even writing that sentence tells me i ought to 'get out more') where someone (Mr Brian perhaps) suggested that we could just about cobble a decent album from flowers, siberia and fountain - i actually tried to do it, i.e., choose a track list by listenening to them back to back. only lasted a couple of goes before it did my head in, and i had to, literally, get out.

[Dr Cheese]

Hmmmm ... where's my Ipod ...

[Mr. Brian]

And is it me or is he repeating melody lines from post reformation albums all over the place?

No, it's not you I thought that as well.

This isn't specific to Meteorites. Mac has been recycling melodies and lyrics for years. I know this has been discussed before. I couldn't find a specific thread and I know there is more but a quick search here turned up the following...Rust/Ribbons and Chains, All My Life/Everlasting Neverendless, Rocket Ship/Holy Grail.
Nothing wrong with bringing back melodies or lines from songs you thought were great but most never heard the first time around. I think Rust/Ribbons and Chains is a good example of him improving ideas from a previous song.

[meh]

[quote="mark"] I wa expecting a pile of steaming pish, and found a very well polished turd. /quote]





that's like saying its the taj mahal around these parts

[black francis]

Now, wheres me time machine, set the controls to 1980........

wait for the rest of us!!!!!!

Room for one more?

[withahip]

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/193 ... eteorites/



Ian McCulloch is only 55 years old, but from a quick read of the lyrics on Meteorites, you could be forgiven for thinking he was a lot closer to death. The whole album has its eyes pointed over its shoulder or upward at a deity that may or may not be there, taking stock and setting the table for a possible next life in turn. These aren’t really new themes for an Echo & the Bunnymen album, but they’ve never quite felt like this on one of their records before. They’ve been slowing down for a while now, but here they feel nearly worn out.

Part of this may be down to the fact that for five albums now, the band has been reduced to a duo of McCulloch and guitarist Will Sergeant, and as distinctive as they both are, they miss the rhythmic push they used to get when they had a fully integrated rhythm section with as much creative agency in the band. Sergeant actually plays in another band, Poltergeist, with former Bunnymen bassist Les Pattinson, but the bass player’s absence is palpable here. Most of these tracks lumber along, and Sergeant has virtually nothing to play against.

As for the overall sound, producer Youth might as well have a button on his mixing board labeled “Dave Fridmann." The opening title track sounds a little like a Yoshimi-era Flaming Lips ballad that never quite reaches the overload of that band. Look through the track list and you’ll find a lot of portentous song titles—“Explosions,” “Burn It Down”, “Holy Moses”—but while the titles might conjure the powerful group that made Heaven Up Here, nothing here approaches that level of intensity. The part of the chorus to “Explosions” where McCulloch talks about erosion feels more descriptive of the processes at work in the music that the part where he talks about things blowing up.

For his part, Sergeant is still a fine guitarist, but he really only gets a few chances to shine. “Market Town” pounds a lot harder than anything else on the album, and you can feel the energy it injects into his playing, while “Constantinople” is decked out in one of his signature pastiches of Arabic melody. McCulloch seems to have picked the title of “Constantinople” for the word itself and not for any of its meaning; he even reminds himself that it’s now called Istanbul.

When they first reunited in 1997, I never figured I’d still be listening to new Echo & the Bunnymen records almost twenty years later, and I still like hearing that voice and that guitar. But the band ran out of things to prove a long time ago, and as uncertain as the lyrics have become, the music has largely drifted into a comfort zone the band can’t quite coax itself out of.

[falconer]

reminds me of a thread a while back (and even writing that sentence tells me i ought to 'get out more') where someone (Mr Brian perhaps) suggested that we could just about cobble a decent album from flowers, siberia and fountain - i actually tried to do it, i.e., choose a track list by listenening to them back to back. only lasted a couple of goes before it did my head in, and i had to, literally, get out.

This is an interesting idea. I'd like to know if a great album(something that could hold it's own against the first four) could be cobbled together from post reformation releases. Doesn't seem impossible. Ideally, it would be really something if we could get the stems of the songs as well and make a cohesive album production wise. Off to my iPod as well.

[Wabbit]

yeah, what would be the best Ocean Rain -esque closer track?....... Forgiven, Rust, WAYGDWYL, Burn For Me, Idolness of Gods, What If We Are, Meteorites or Burn It Down ....

[black francis]

I like the end of What If We Are when Mac asks "Have I hit rock bottom?"

Feels very heartfelt.

[fat cherry]

read the manual !!

[lazarus]

Going up then.
Meteorites topic.

[Wabbit]

I like the end of What If We Are when Mac asks "Have I hit rock bottom?"

Feels very heartfelt.

I can't listen to it coz it sounds too real....

[black francis]

Anyone still listening to the new album? After a couple of weeks I find myself playing Lovers on the Run on purpose. The rest come on by accident if at all. Curious what people's feelings are now that they've had a chance to spend some time with it.