“Rock That?s Oh So Stupid Yet Oh So Intelligent”
By STEPHIN MERRITT
The New York Times 5/16/04
DELAYS You can’t tell a word Greg Gilbert is saying on this English band’s debut album, “Faded Seaside Glamour” (Rough Trade), and you won’t care; his soaring falsetto is that beautiful. The first single, “Nearer Than Heaven,” sounds pretty close to heaven already and quotes Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game” while surpassing it in liquid pop ecstasy. Although the rest of the album lacks variety, Mr. Gilbert showcases his Hollies fetish in entertaining ways throughout. Maybe Delays and the Darkness will start a great castrati revival in England, and there will be a new golden age of music.
THE KILLERS Retro new-wave Britpoppers from Las Vegas with genuine fake British accents, the Killers sound uncomfortably like a lot of bands (Interpol, often) on “Hot Fuss” (Island Def Jam). But with songs like the homoerotic power ballad “Andy, You’re a Star,” the teen angst power ballad “Smile Like You Mean It” and the sarcastic power ballad “Everything Will Be Alright,” they’ll appeal to teenagers who don’t know the sources. The songs deserve better than these unvarying distorted guitars, and maybe on their next album the Killers will get a bit more subtle, like playing a nice, depressing acoustic guitar. Meanwhile, they’ll be popular anyway because they’re adorable.
MORRISSEY His new album, “You Are the Quarry” (Sanctuary), demonstrates more than ever that the best lyricist in rock, Morrissey, still surrounds himself with dull musicians incapable of properly filling out his introspective kitchen-sink dramas. Plodding generic rock ‘n’ roll accompanies “Where taxi drivers never stop talking, under slate-gray Victorian sky: Here you’ll find despair and I.” At this level of lyric artistry, these warmed-over arena rock backdrops are a waste. One longs to lock him up for a year with, say, the pop orchestra the High Llamas, so lyrics like “I’ve been dreaming of a time when to be English is not to be baneful, to be standing by the flag not feeling shameful, racist or martial” can be matched by equally thoughtful arrangements.
About the Delays disc: None of the album tracks is as awesome and majestic as this b-side from the Hey Girl single. Everyone I’ve played this for has loved it. Enjoy.
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I stand by both yours and Merritt’s assessments of the Delays record. 2nd best record I’ve heard all year (first being the Moonbabies disc, third being the upcoming Two Lone Swordsmen disc).
It’s “partial”, Stephen, not “martial”! Get it right or pay the price!
The Delays record is one of those albums that I thought would grow on me, but then never did.
“Nearer Than Heaven” is currently one of my favorite tracks…but nothing beats Graham Coxon’s new record right now for sheer poptastic genius. The lost Blur album, indeed.
I don’t know Mr. Merrit from Adam, but he doesn’t have a very informed view of The Killers. When I read this in yesterday’s Times, I was mildly bemused. How cool and cynical of a quote-unquote rockstar tobe so snide!
The Interpol reference is the first time I’ve heard anyone (in over 2 yrs) compare the Killers to them. Completely different bands, in the way that Joy Division and the Psychedelic Furs were completely different (I would have said JD and New Order if I felt like being Merritesquely snide).
Power Ballads? What is this, a Cinderella/Poison/(post-Shout at the Devil) Motley Crue reunion? The Killers write pop songs, just like Elvis Costello has for years. “Power Ballad” is a slag of the first rate (unless you are talking about a forgotten Canadian band like Platinum Blonde and trying to evoke their specific area of expertise).
Saying that The Killers will appeal to teens who don’t know the sources is just insulting. Just as grunge mined the hard rock of the 70′s and produced some nuggets, the current “New-New Wave” minitrend is doing the same. And just as grunge devolved into Creed, so, too, will this trend. Our only hope, and it seems like this is one to back, is that bands like The Killers can evolve from their retro roots and set themselves up for a solid & stable career. I know that most of the bands who doing in the 80′s retro thing now (Morrisey and The Cure excepted) will not turn out to be phenomenally classic in 20 years. But based solely on the strength of “Mr. Brightside” (not to mention “Jenny” and “Somebody Told Me”), The Killers will be one of those bands on your 15th Generation iPod in 2024.
umm… i like the killers too. i think the best description i ever encountered for them (read: the most accurate) actually used an interpol reference.
anyway, the description:
The Killers sound like Gay Interpol.
Mind you, this is a fantastic description and not at all intended to put down the killers in anyway.
I don’t really like the Killers, I’m afraid: they’re just another new name that the British press has hyped and foisted upon a gullible foreign audience. But, hey, it sells magazines and iPods, so who can blame them. In any case, comparisons to Interpol are arrant nonsense…
tracks 3 & 6 on that Delays album are unbelievable (Long Time Coming and You Wear The Sun)
this is like the sophmore album the La’s never got to release imo
> this is like the sophmore album the La’s never > got to release
I was just thinking that about the new Gomez record.