My CDs: 4: Arcade Fire
270 words, 2 images(Well, Wednesday flew by without my noticing: the first slip up. I blame Grand Theft Auto IV.)
The thing with CDs is, I buy them, I rip them to MP3, I look at the packaging a bit, then I put them on the shelf where they stay. A nice thing about doing these blog entries is that I return to the shelf to look. I’m not allowing myself to blog about stuff I don’t own as a physical CD.
It was a bit of a surprise to find that I didn’t have either of these Arcade Fire albums as physical CDs, so I rectified the situation by buying them.
… and now I don’t really know what to write about them, except that they’re great. It was Neon Bible I heard first. As usual on the good weeks, it’s hard to pick out highlights, but if I must, No Cars Go - anthemic without quite reaching U2/Coldplay levels of pomp. In a Glastonbury forum leading up to their Glastonbury appearance last year, someone described them as ‘just a Talking Heads clone’, so I bought some Talking Heads. Talking Heads are great - but really the only likeness is a certain ring in Wim Butler’s voice.
I heard the debut album Funeral second - backfilling my Arcade Fire experience. It’s the better album by a tiny margin, having a nice bit of continuity in the Neighbourhood #1, #2, #3, #4 series of songs, spine tingling glory in Wake Up, and a beautiful delicate denouement in In the Back Seat.
Note - I usually hate strings, but I don’t hate this by a long way.
Highly, highly recommended.