Beulah Land

Interpol-Our Love to Admire

There has been a vicious battle taking place underneath your noses. A battle of infinite proportions. A battle to determine the fate of the entire planet. OR maybe just a bunch of internet dorks sitting around calling each other ****heads and ****'s on shoutboxes throughout the blogosphere. It's all surrounding Interpol and their upcoming release "Our Love to Admire" and it's inevitable leaking.
I have to admit, I had been anticipating its pre-release-internet release for awhile now and have been duly impressed by this record's seeming imperviousness to the spindly tendrils of the music blog/file-sharing community. especially at witnessing the fervor it was causing among the critics and fans online who seemed to grow exponentially more rabid with every passing day.
But with all this hype and given the anti-climactic trickling out of shitty radio rip cobbled together versions of the album. Compounded by the out of the blue leaking of a number of other FANTASTIC albums I wasn't expecting until much later in the year, Our Love to Admire sort of faded into the background. And by the time I actually heard the record I already felt a little exhausted or at the very least underwhelmed by it.

Honestly, I think it's good. Not great. At points it seems like it's about to get better than anything you've heard from them before. It flirts. And perhaps this is that thing that happens as you get older where certain albums can never be lived up to. Or maybe my tastes have just changed. But I hear a creeping, insidious tinge of big studio bombast farting all over Our Love to Admire. And I can't get past it. The sort of sound where you can almost hear the crushing pressure of a major label debut for a band that is already riding on equal parts style and substance, written into the DNA of the record. It's just a bit too much show at times. When the songs are bigger than life like this all I can think of is the soundtrack to a superhero movie or the Wallflowers covering David Bowie for the Godzilla remake or something.

It's not all like that by any means. And sometimes when it is they make it work. I highly enjoy "Who Do You Think?" and "Heinrich Maneuver".
This record is by no means unlistenable. But at best it's a mood record. You have to get yourself there. It's not gonna lead you.

One more thing about Our Love to Admire. We all know that Paul Bank's isn't exactly a lyrical genius or anything. But the earnest delivery of the line, "you look so young, like a daisy in my lazy eye". No. I can't accept that. I'm not fucking joking. that's a real part of a real Interpol song.





VA-After Dark
alternatelink


I've been looking for the After Dark compilation ever since I started hearing Glass Candy's new material for Italians Do It Better towards the end of the winter in Portland. There's been quite a buzz surrounding the material on this compilation outside of Portland since then.
With good reason, this compilation is amazing and a perfect example of the power and emotional range Italo disco can have if given the proper opportunity.











Animal Collective-Strawberry Jam


SURPRISE!! Ok, don't go overboard this isn't the whole album. Just the first 2/3. But it's too good to wait for the rest.

I know some of you (Kari) haven't been huge fans of Animal Collective in the past. But I strongly encourage you to check this out. I feel this might be the Animal Collective album that wins you over.

That's all I'll say, I don't want to over-sell it.