"CAVE-O-SAPIAN" - best rock song of 2010!

ROCK IS GOOD AGAIN

I have never really been much of a Wolf Parade fan.  I enjoyed their first acclaimed release, Apologies to the Queen Mary, but I didn't really get too much from it.  It felt like there were going for a raw, kind of early Modest Mouse-rough but poppy-vibe and trying too hard.  The had an unsettled sound, an unsure sound.  It didn't help any that they took an animal name like every other mid '00s indie rock band.  Subsequently I never checked out their second album.  But for some reason, the other day I decided to pick up a copy Expo '86 and boy am I glad I did! 

Wolf Parade has released one of the best rock albums I've heard in years.  Poppy, energetic, clever, and delightful.  Driving melodies, super tight drumming, and clean guitars guide these songs.  The damn thing hooked me from the start.  You can certainly hear bits of other rock titans in the music, but they own this album.  The difference is they  homage and building on the music and the past. 

The songs on this release are top-to bottom excellent!  It's the kind of album that any given track could get stuck in your head.  I haven't been so enamored immediately by a release in a long time.  The highlight, though, has got to be the closing track "Cave-O-Sapien".  That song overcomes it's silly title (and lyrics) to be one of the best rock songs I've heard in a while.  Damn if there isn't some "oh oh oh oh ooohs" and such on it!  Great stuff  4.5 Molos!


Everyone has been waiting for the new Arcade Fire to come out; well it's here and it's really good.  The Suburbs.  Arcade Fire is a great band, one of the best live bands of the decade, and you have to see them if you have not. 

I doubt they will ever write an album as ground-breaking and universally loved as Funeral (nor should they try). The Suburbs is not attempting to be another Funeral.  It feels like the next chapter in the story, though, especially lyrically.  More mature?  Yes.  And the tracks are more consistent front to back than either of their first 2 albums - there are no duds on The Suburbs.  

That being said, there's something missing - this album is excellent, but it feels too easy.  There is beauty and some great songs.  But maybe they are just almost too good for their own good.  That doesn't make sense, and I don't have time to elaborate on it...but maybe this album is just one more strong step on some kind of amazing musical journey.  If any contemporary band can take us on such a journey, The Arcade Fire is the one.  4 Molos


School of Seven Bells released an album Disconnect from Desire a couple weeks ago that might be in danger of getting ignored in the wave of Arcade Fire love, but I hope that is not the case.  I love this band!  But it's not the kind of music you can listen to all the time, there's a lot of repetitiveness in their music, heightened by the twin Deheza sister's lovely harmonizing - really all they music is built around the vocals, to create stunning atmosphere.  Disconnect is a stronger, more diverse and better-written follow up to the very good Alpinisms and in spots it moves their sound a little further away from the shoegazer to pop to good effect.  You should check it out!.  By the way, Wikipedia says their name comes from "a mythical South American pickpocket training academy"  3.5 Molos