‘Love Is Dead’ is, as many commentators have already pointed out, a lot like Chris Pine’s penis. I can appreciate it, I understand why people might like it, and it’s definitely technically extremely sound. I can even perceive things about it that people would definitely like, and in theory there are many things about it that I should really be a fan of. On paper, ‘Love is Dead’/Chris Pine’s penis should be something I’m really into, they’re both legitimately ‘dazzling‘, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with either of them and there are no holes I can pick in…

I mean… yeah… I suppose that… Chris Pine’s penis… pick a hole… Never mind, this analogy is golden. Let’s move along.

And yet…

I get next to nothing…

Neither ‘Love is Dead’ nor Captain Kirk’s Starship sufficiently moves me. And, trust me, I’ve really tried with both.

I have a friend. Honestly. He’s actually my oldest and… deares…? Hmmm…

He’s actually my oldest friend, and I continue to frequently associate with him despite the fact he has repeatedly stated that the Manic Street Preachers look like dinner ladies, which is needlessly hurtful whatever its truthfulness. About two years ago I gave him a USB stick with all the best recent music on it (basically just lazily copied off what most people regard as the definitive online music source) as he likes to pretend he’s an adult these days by only listening to slave owners and Nazis* and I thought it’d be nice for him to get an idea of what us cool kids listen to. Because you’re a devoted- some would say religious- reader of this blog, you’ll know the sort of stuff I would have recommended, and you’ll know what kind of straight fire, bang up the elephant basic quality we’re talking about.

(*I mean… probably, right? All classical music is made by rich white guys, and the first ever rich white guy to be neither a Nazi or a slave owner was Scrooge McDuck, who historians dispute ever even existed. Yeah, I know, I thought I’d be able to think of a funnier name too. Fuck off, this is the fourth entry I’ve written today. This is pretty much the quality you’re going to have to get used to, I’m afraid, there’s a lot of albums to get through. Yeah. This year stinks, doesn’t it?)

Now, I should have mentioned previously that this friend is a human being, and therefore has his own complex mental processes and separate opinions, and because of these unfortunate mental deficiencies he didn’t agree with all of my scientifically proven recommendations. He loved some (Young Fathers, Dan Deacon), thought some of it was alright, ‘spose (pretty much everything else), and he only actually hated one artist. An artist I loved so much that I sent him both of their albums. He hated CHVRCHES, which I had previously assumed impossible for anyone save the most passionate supporter of correct spelling or enemy of search engine optimisation. For two years I had simply put this down to him being an idiot and/or deaf, but after listening to ‘Love is Dead’…

I could never get into ‘Love is Dead’, there was some barrier to me adoring it to a similar extent as their first two albums, something I couldn’t explain. Was I… growing up…?! Is the new indifference towards CHVRCHES* the first sign of me finally embracing old age? Would this mean that in the near future I could only listen to dull classical music albums like…

…

…

…

The Lord of the Rings soundtrack…? Or… the Braveheart soundtrack…? What was Mozart’s debut album called? Did he do ‘Free Peace Sweet’? Like your testicles, your heart starts to hang impossibly low and heavy when you get old, and it was with this solemness that I listened to the first two CHVRCHES albums again to remind myself of the kind of silly nonsense the young Alex Palmer used to naively enjoy…

(*It’s stylised as capitalised, so you have to shout it every time you read it. Stylised as capitalised. Stylised as capitalised. Is there a way of saying that that doesn’t sound like the start of a Kool Herc song?)

Lies (2013)

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaars!!! This song is fucking awesome! This freaking album is awesome! The second album is awesome! Fuck you Tchaikovsky, you old Russian cuntflap, you never wrote a song as good as Never Ending Circles! I’m not getting old, ‘Love is Dead’ is just a crap album! Thank the lord!

So, erm, do I have to look at somebody’s penis now? That analogy is a bit confusing, I’ll admit

49 Minutes

That’s such a 2013 album length, isn’t it? ‘LID’ isn’t a bad album at all, and has at least one song that I’d rank along CHVRCHES’s* best ever. It’s technically very good, just not quite there as CHVRCHES albums have been in the past.

(*Shout the name, but whisper the pluralising ‘S’ at the end. ‘Pluralising’? Fuck off…)

CHVRCHES: Forever

VS

Prince: 4Ever

Hmmm, I’ve already named ‘‘ as His most underrated (least rated… underrest rated… Lest overrated…) album, so I can’t really say the same for ‘Lotusflow3r’, can I? OK, check this- the 2009 internet only album ‘Lotusflow3r’ is His most hidden treasure, yeah?? Despite its esoteric release and lack of the promotion, the obscure 33rd (!) album is actually an amazing collection of relatively standard pop/rock bangers, of which 4Ever is a great example. CHVRCHES? I mean, thanks for turning up…

Previous Entries

2013 (No.13)

2015 (No.10)

Hey, another massively disappointing third album! Trend! Trend! Trend! Trend!