Artist: Franz Ferdinand
Album: Tonight: Franz Ferdinand
Year: 2009
Grade: 3 pretzels
Franz Ferdinand are essentially cursed by their 2004 debut album. Of course, it’s not their fault that they started their career with the finest pop-rock album of the decade. But now, five years down the line, it hangs like a horrifying, guitar-hook-filled shadow over everything they’ve done since. Every album they make will be compared to their debut and only absolute pop perfection will look good in comparison. It’s all kinds of unfair, but that’s the way it is. Sorry guys.
They clearly know all of this on Tonight: Franz Ferdinand, which is a stone-cold “transitional record” if I ever heard one. The band flails in different directions, trying to find some way out of the labyrinth they’ve created for themselves with their debut. Clearly inspired by some dance music and taking a cue from “Outsiders”, the brilliant track which ended 2005’s You Could Have It So Much Better, keyboards are slathered over all the tracks on Tonight. Some songs benefit immensely from the electronics; “Twilight Omens” is a wonderful, deranged raver with some hilarious lyrics (“I typed your number into my calculator/will it spell a dirty word when I turn it upside down?” is a particularly good zinger). However, others, “Live Alone” especially, end up sinking back into the old keyboard standby: the “beeps and shit” school of music. Too often the songs just end up sounding like “Franz Ferdinand…oh, yeah, with some keyboards on the side,” rather than really incorporating and using the new shiny electronics.
At the same time, a few tracks look back and try to emulate the debut album's charms. Again, this creates some hits and misses. “Turn It On” is a sleek, sexy little song, with a memorable, snaky guitar riff to guide it along. Balancing things out, we have the very next track, “No You Girls”, a routine, Ferdinand-by-numbers tune. “Katherine Kiss Me”, the lovely acoustic ballad that ends the album, tries and mostly succeeds to recapture the magic of 2005’s “Eleanor Put Your Boots Back On”, but the other ballad, “Dream Again”, sounds somewhat lost and half-baked. Of course, singer Alex Kapranos does a valiant effort trying to save each and every song with his incredible charisma, which, as with most Franz songs, translates right through the record and into your ears. Franz Ferdinand are truly a blessed band with a frontman like Kapranos at the helm. If only they could find a way to get that blessing to cancel out the debut-album-curse…
The band’s attempts at breaking out of their previous sound are admirable. The best way to avoid comparison with previous work is to do something totally different. Unfortunately, the record is torn in ten different directions, as the band try to split the difference between their traditional sound and their experimental instincts. The album’s centerpiece, “Lucid Dreams”, showcases this wonderfully. It starts out sounding like a traditional, if slightly boring Franz song and ends (eight minutes later!) with a collection of sounds I never thought I’d hear on a Franz record: squelchy electronic bass, a synth riff Justice would kill for and a clattering rhythm section that sounds like it’s on loan from Einsturzende Neubauten. It’s the perfect microcosm for the album as a whole: a conflicted stab at reinvention being taken in too many directions at once.
They clearly know all of this on Tonight: Franz Ferdinand, which is a stone-cold “transitional record” if I ever heard one. The band flails in different directions, trying to find some way out of the labyrinth they’ve created for themselves with their debut. Clearly inspired by some dance music and taking a cue from “Outsiders”, the brilliant track which ended 2005’s You Could Have It So Much Better, keyboards are slathered over all the tracks on Tonight. Some songs benefit immensely from the electronics; “Twilight Omens” is a wonderful, deranged raver with some hilarious lyrics (“I typed your number into my calculator/will it spell a dirty word when I turn it upside down?” is a particularly good zinger). However, others, “Live Alone” especially, end up sinking back into the old keyboard standby: the “beeps and shit” school of music. Too often the songs just end up sounding like “Franz Ferdinand…oh, yeah, with some keyboards on the side,” rather than really incorporating and using the new shiny electronics.
At the same time, a few tracks look back and try to emulate the debut album's charms. Again, this creates some hits and misses. “Turn It On” is a sleek, sexy little song, with a memorable, snaky guitar riff to guide it along. Balancing things out, we have the very next track, “No You Girls”, a routine, Ferdinand-by-numbers tune. “Katherine Kiss Me”, the lovely acoustic ballad that ends the album, tries and mostly succeeds to recapture the magic of 2005’s “Eleanor Put Your Boots Back On”, but the other ballad, “Dream Again”, sounds somewhat lost and half-baked. Of course, singer Alex Kapranos does a valiant effort trying to save each and every song with his incredible charisma, which, as with most Franz songs, translates right through the record and into your ears. Franz Ferdinand are truly a blessed band with a frontman like Kapranos at the helm. If only they could find a way to get that blessing to cancel out the debut-album-curse…
The band’s attempts at breaking out of their previous sound are admirable. The best way to avoid comparison with previous work is to do something totally different. Unfortunately, the record is torn in ten different directions, as the band try to split the difference between their traditional sound and their experimental instincts. The album’s centerpiece, “Lucid Dreams”, showcases this wonderfully. It starts out sounding like a traditional, if slightly boring Franz song and ends (eight minutes later!) with a collection of sounds I never thought I’d hear on a Franz record: squelchy electronic bass, a synth riff Justice would kill for and a clattering rhythm section that sounds like it’s on loan from Einsturzende Neubauten. It’s the perfect microcosm for the album as a whole: a conflicted stab at reinvention being taken in too many directions at once.
I feel so bad for them sometimes. Their first album is a slice of genius and their second album, well, compared to their first sound like a bunch of well refined B-sides.
ReplyDeleteThen this comes along and the only time I remembered liking them was High School.
Sorry guys. *Sad Face*