Elbow - Build A Rocket Boys!
So Elbow return with their 5th album Build A Rocket Boys!. After the mercury prize winning and hugely successful album The Seldom Seen Kid which brought them many new fans, their task was not unlike a band who had made a successful début album and now have to follow it up with their sophomore effort. Not that their debut album Asleep In The Back wasn’t highly acclaimed it just didn’t reach as many fans as in my opinion as it should have.
So to the album itself, opener The Birds is an epic opening shot which finds both Guy Garvey and the rest of the band in fine fettle, it’s both understated and beautiful with Guy telling us how the “birds keep our secrets”.
Next up is Lippy Kids which is a lament to the forgotten youths, who are often over looked as petty criminals and a waste of space. Guy implores them “to build a rocket boys” and to make something of themselves. In a similar vein to The Birdsit is very gentle but builds to a beautiful climax with Guy’s voice worthy of a particular mention in the beauty of the song.
With Love is built around a cascading piano riff and the Hallé Youth Choir backing the band on the chorus.
Its not until the first single Neat Little Rows that you remember this band can do rockier songs just as well as the ballads, with a crunchy guitar riff it finds the band in high spirits, and seems to be this album’s Ground For Divorce
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Jesus Is A Rochdale Girl takes us back to a probably simpler time where its just a flat, a girlfriend some records and a cluttered backyard. It is an acoustic which seems to hits the album’s theme of youthful exuberance on the head.
Open Arms is for want of a better comparison, this record’s most anthemic song, which Guy and the Choir singing “We’ve got open arms for broken hearts” and it will take some time to see if it replaces One Day Like This as the festival crowd pleaser.
Last song on the record Dear Friends ties up the album nicely and is a message to the band’s friends that whoever they are and whatever they might be, they are loved equally.
So what do I think to this record, in a word BRILLIANT, the band could of made a strange unaccessible record or one full of One Day Like This anthems. Instead they made another great record on their terms, with all songs having room to breathe and both the musicianship and the song writing really shining through. This record makes me want to go and fetch old photo albums, ring old friends and celebrate life that is for living today but looking to the past the can be an amazing thing.
Go and buy this record and I’m sure you will feel the same. Another great record from one of Britain’s best loved bands.
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