Sometimes when I discover a new cultural plaything that speaks to me, I become temporarily obsessed with it. This applies to film (Donnie Darko and The Lives of Others, for example, had this effect on me), TV, books, but particularly music. I will zero in on a band’s oeuvre and just listen and listen and evaluate every chord and every beat until I need a break. In the case of a band like London’s Grand National, this is going to take a few days. I completely missed the boat on their 2004 debut album (apparently I wasn’t alone in this), although I did hear their name drifting around in the ether.

I snapped to attention the other night while streaming “Metropolis” on KCRW out of Santa Monica. The single “By The Time I Get Home There Won’t Be Much of a Place for Me” has chunky, slow, swaying and somehow understated beats, along with a plaintive piano riff and vocals about hearing music that reminds one of going to visit friends with whom you talk about “nothing.” The whole package just stopped me dead in my mental tracks - it’s everything I like about Talk Talk, New Order, PIL and Perry Farrell, pleasingly reheated and reformulated. Check out the link to the video for this track - it’s off their new album.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 18th, 2007 at 6:53 pm and is filed under Mat's Thoughts (twitter: matsmall). You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.