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Friday, January 26, 2007

Follow the City Lights

Post number 245. Consecutive day of posting number 146. Number of posts in a row by yours truly: 16. In other words, what on Earth could I talk about? That's what I was wondering today, when the answer all but presented itself: music.
When I was in Spain over Christmas, my friend Óscar played for me the new single of a Spanish band named Dover. I knew them, but had never been too impressed with their music. Their new single, Let Me Out (yeah, they sing in English), was, however, a complete departure from their old style (there's a lot of people cursing their name, as it is). And I loved the song. Unfortunately, I didn't get to listen to the whole CD before returning to good old Chattaparty and did therefore not buy it, so that was that, I thought. Then my dear friend Jorge said he was coming to the US, and I, being the great friend I am, told him I would be delighted to see him... bring me Dover's CD, Follow the City Lights.
Jorge is great, and he did bring the CD last weekend, but I didn't really get to listen to it until a couple of days ago, the main reason being that I couldn't get past Let Me Out, which happens to be the first song of the album. But I managed to get to the second one, Do Ya, and realized that I liked it almost as much as the first one. So I got stuck on it. Then came the third one, Keep on Moving, which I liked as much as the first one, if not better. So I was listening to it time and again. Again, I managed to get past that song, and discovered songs four and five were also okay, but not as good as the previous three. "It had to happen," I told myself. And then song six, Tonight, blew me away.
I knew there couldn't be any other song I was going to like better than this one, so I kept playing it over and over, still having not heard the second half of the album. At some point I decided I had to be brave, and braced myself for disappointment. Thus, the seventh song came, and it possibly is the weakest (also the shortest) one on the CD. "It had to happen," I repeated.
Then song eight came and rocked my freaking world.
Madrid is the title of the aforementioned song, even though the name of the city Dover sing about is never mentioned in the lyrics. What they repeat in the chorus is the title of the album, Follow the City Lights. The song is fantastic, and it is, by far, my favorite song. The song is so good that now I knew it just couldn't be surpassed. It was just not within the realm of possibility. It just could not be done, simple as that.
I was right. The last two songs are also good, but nowhere near my favorites, which at this point include songs 1, 2, 3, 6, and 8: five ridiculously impressive songs, half the CD. And the other five are good too, just not amazing like the other half.
The music in the whole CD is very, very electronic, all the tracks being fast, upbeat dance pieces, short clips of which you can find here. With catchy tunes and cool guitar riffs, Follow the City Lights also has a retro flavor that I enjoy very much, and the album is the right length to keep you wanting to play it over and over. So if you like this kind of music, do not hesitate and buy Follow the City Lights. As always, you can thank me later.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The phone is ringing, the clock is ticking...

Mario Alba said...

Hahahaha. You got it :)