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My iPod #326: Blur – End of a Century

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Have you ever gone on casually going about on your daily routine knowing that something big and life changing was on the horizon, but you’re just that person too wrapped up in your own life or what’s happening on the television to realise it? Well, I think that’s what Damon Albarn was thinking about when he was writing the lyrics to “End of a Century”, the third track and last single from the 1994 album “Parklife“.

If I was a little older in 1999 – maybe ten or eleven (around those ages) – I would probably be able to tell you how much people were going crazy for the start of the new millennium. I can’t because I was about four and I can barely remember living in the nineties anyway. The only thing I remember vaguely around the start of 2000 was the “Millennium Bug” where all the electricity was supposed to go out and there would be no more power. Even now, I have no idea what it was about.

While there was obviously a large majority of the world who did care that the world was entering a new era, you can’t say that there weren’t some people existing then who didn’t. Thought it was ‘nothing special’. Saw it just like any other day, and were more interested in carrying on with their lives.

So listen to this track, because it’s coming from a guy who was very much aware of what was going on at that time. Well, six years before anyway.

My iPod #280: Fall Out Boy – Disloyal Order of Water Buffaloes

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Fall Out Boy time. I listened to “Save Rock and Roll“. Wasn’t too great. And it was their first one after a four year hiatus. Disappointing. Everything sounded so manufactured and poppy, ironically. For me, “Folie à Deux” is the band’s best album. It’s their worst-selling one, which I don’t understand. If you haven’t listened to it, I suggest you should.

The album opens with this track “Disloyal Order of Water Buffaloes”, a song about imperfection with a title that is a reference to The Flintstones. I don’t get it either, but a lot of Fall Out Boy song titles are weird in that way. I’m not liking the way I’m sounding, I’ll get serious from now on.

The song is another great album opener out of all the ones I have on my iPod. It does use the same chord progression as “Baba O’Riley” albeit in a different key – that’s a random point I chose to throw in there. What I like about the track is how it never slows down or takes a breather for a bit. The track mostly revolves around the drums, played by Andy Hurley, changing in dynamics at various points like in the second pre-chorus where Patrick Stump continues to sing with sporadic multi-tracked vocals along with a noodling electric guitar, or near the ending when the “detox just to retox” refrain is chanted continuously. Plus, Patrick Stump absolutely kills it on the vocals. It seems like all the singing on the previous ones were all leading up to this particular one because here he is at his peak on every track.

“Water Buffaloes” is hard to describe if you couldn’t tell from my convoluted ‘summary’. It’s one of those that I knew was good on first listen. You can’t listen to it by itself though, it doesn’t have a proper ending. Listen to it along with the twelve other tracks that follow. That’s the best way to hear it.

My iPod #260: Billy Talent – Definition of Destiny

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You know what I just figured out? Literally a few minutes before typing this, every last song on Billy Talent’s albums from “Voices of Violence” to “Dead Silence” went through my mind. Despite differences in tempo, structure and everything – all of them are in D major… I wonder why that is. Do you think that they even realised this? Has anyone else pointed this out before? What the hell, Billy Talent, what the hell. They are all solid tracks, I have all of them on my iPod, but they have to use another key sooner or later, right?

On with today’s song.

“Definition of Destiny” is the final track on Billy Talent’s third album “Billy Talent III”, the last of their usual Roman numerical naming order, released in 2009. Normally the last songs on Billy Talent albums are worth the wait, and the same applied to “Definition” too. It is quite similar to “Burn the Evidence” in that the instrumentation during the verses mirrors the reflective and observational lyrics, staying at a steady beat and keeping a cool rhythm with guitar arpeggios, before turning the levels up and continuing into a stomping and chord heavy chorus which puts emphasis on the intense message of living life to the full your own way before ending up in the casket. Good way to end an album all in all.

I won’t say too much about listening to the album for the first time or how I felt waiting for its release; I’ll probably save that for “Devil on My Shoulder”. However, I will simply state my opinion which is that ‘III’ is not their best work. Some may agree, others may not. The album is okay, but not as good as their first two. The production is different (which is understandable as they used the same producer for the two before) but the tracks lack in something as a result. Less of a bite in guitar tone, perhaps. But most importantly…. there is barely any screaming. That was a disappointment on first listen.

My iPod #242: Franz Ferdinand – Darts of Pleasure

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This is no mistake. I have no song by another artist between this one and yesterday’s, so here’s Franz Ferdinand again. This time with “Darts of Pleasure”, another track from their debut album. It was actually their first single, months before anyone would know about “Take Me Out”, and just missed out on a Top 40 place reaching #44 in the UK singles chart. The song itself is about the use of words to seduce somebody. The words are the darts of pleasure.

I can’t exactly remember when I first saw the video for “Darts”, but I have a feeling that the other singles from the album had already been released before I saw it on MTV2. It seems to be on a low budget compared to their later videos which is standard as it was their first single. In it, the viewer sees life from the point of view of Alex Kapranos’ mouth where various antics occur. It’s funny or icky depending on how you look at it.

The best part is definitely the coda with the German lyrics during the final minute, why the band chose to use it we’ll never know but I’m not complaining.

My iPod #241: Franz Ferdinand – The Dark of the Matinée

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“The Dark of the Matinée” was the second single from Franz Ferdinand’s debut album, released in February 2004.

According to Kapranos, or what I could make from him before he introduced this song at a festival, the track is about skiving off school and hiding away in the shadows of the matinée. Every music channel showed the song as simply “Matinée” which is (I’m guressing) what everybody generally calls it. Maybe even some Franz Ferdinand fans if they’re too occupied to say the full title. Either way it is the same song, but it is the darkness of the matinée which is being specified that is being established as the hiding place, and not just the building itself.

Whatever.

It is remarkable to think it has been ten years since I first heard this. This was one of my favourite songs at the time. I thought the video made the song even better. The ‘robotic’ choreography, Alex Kapranos’ fringe and the huge painting of Terry Wogan during the final verse. I had daydreams of being in a band and making a video like it. I wanted Looking at it now makes me want to that eight years old who would wake up early in the morning to watch MTV2, actually watch music videos and discover bands for the first time all over again.

It wasn’t as successful as “Take Me Out”, which I’ll get on to ages from now, but to me it certainly brings back some good memories.