Sound of Silver

I'm still getting used to this whole blog post album reveiw thing. My last reveiw I jotted of kinda of quickly and it wasn't what I wanted so I think I'm going to start with an album I really know. And that is Sound of Silver. LCD Soundsystem is one of my favorite bands. They call themselves a "dance-punk" band but I want to avoid such pigeon hole labels and say they just make insanely catchy music with lots of irony, pathos, and humor. Sound of Silver builds upon many of the strengths of their debut album and the result is a dance album with an incredible amount of depth. The wit and irony are still here with "Time To Get Away" and "Watch The Tapes" which are songs that characteristicly berate certain closeminded hipsters and fakes. The real triumpth, though, is 3 of the most heartful songs LCD Soundsystem has produced this year: "Someone Greate," "All My Friends," and "New York I Love You, But You're Bringing Me Down." "Someone Great" is a beautiful lament on losing the love of your life and having to deal with the changes (or lack there of). James Murphy keeps things deliberately vague so you're never quite sure of how the main person in the song lost their loved one or whether it was a girlfriend or a wife. All that's revealed is that the there was a loss and that loss is dealt with humor and sadness. The main character expects that the world would change in responese to his loss. He expects that the whole world would greive with him but instead: "The worst is all the lovely weather / I'm sad, its not raining / The coffee isn't even bitter, because what's the difference?" With all loss one eventually "get's over it" but who knows how long that can take?: "And it keeps coming, till the day it stops." This song is a techno/electronic song but it would never be played in a club. Unless the club was just about to close on an unusally slow night and all the jaded people were gathered at the bar. "All My Friends" is another pathos song in which the main character deals with getting old, another big theme. This one is my personal favorite because it's the first song by this band that I heard. It starts with an undulating keyboard line that serves as the songs intro, bridge, and triumphant refrain. Many of the songs lyrics deal with fatigue, loneliness and the end of things: "It comes apart / the way it does in bad films, / except the part, where the moral kicks in," or " And to tell the truth / Oh, this could be the last time. So here we go, like a sail's force into the night." If only the main character could "see all [his] friends" then things would be better. The album's closer "New York. . ." is a fitting close to the album. The song starts as a piano lament on how James Murphy's beloved New York has cleaned up her act. She's "safer and she's wasting [his] time" "The boring collect" and he "means all disrespect." But in the end New York is "perfect, oh don't change a thing." Other songs on the album are just as heartfelt. There's the gangland demarcation stomp of "Us v Them",  Murphy's good-humored observations on the tirade of Anti-Americansim in "North American Scum" and the most techno like song on the album, with its repeated chant-like refrain, "Sound of Silver." With many repeated listens this album sheds its humor and irony and reveals the pathos of human experience that underlies many of the songs on this album. Also, the album just sounds so damn good. The drums are crisp and puncy and the bass thick. Overall, this isjust a really great album.