[REVIEW] Snow Patrol - Fallen Empires
November 24th 2011 02:45
Snow Patrol - Fallen Empires
It seems like nowadays if a band is looking for a new direction, they always head to more electronic sounds. This is not the exception with Snow Patrol, the Scottish band led by Gary Lightbody. They started off in 1994 as an indie unknown band and the resemblance with Coldplay and U2 made them hit the jackpot with 'Final Straw' ten years later, which will be their first success outside their country of origin. It seems that the three years they took to make their new album, 'Fallen Empires', gave them time to explore a different sound, however they don't seem to have fully achieved their goal, and the record ends up giving us more of their same clean sound and interesting lyrics but with some synthesizers.
The album starts with 'I'll Never Let Go', which at first seems like it's not going anywhere but finally takes off in the middle of the song with the introduction of the drums and makes it one of the most interesting songs of the record. The song is followed by their first single from the album, 'Called Out in the Dark', the commercial song of the album, and it's more catchy than good. On the contrary, 'This Isn't Everything Your Are', the second single, is a beautiful quiet song and Gary's sad voice makes us attuned to it. The next interesting track we bump into is 'Fallen Empires' and we can understand why the album is called like it. It is very different from the rest of the song, which is what the band wanted to achieve in the first place with this album. The strumming pattern makes it very intense and the melody is something we have never heard from them before, which it makes it suprising and probably one of, if not the best song of the record. 'Berlin' and 'Lifening' are very similar among each other, but have nothing new to say, however 'New York' continues with the tranquil atmosphere, but stands out from the rest. The feeling in Gary's voice is what makes the song so interesting and makes us, again, connect with it but the fact that the song grows in intensity as it progresses is what makes it so exciting. The record concludes with 'Broken Bottles Form a Star (Prelude)', an very wise choice. The short instrumental ending wraps the whole album and puts it together perfectly, and even though most of the songs have nothing new to say, it does not stop being a good album, nothing revolutionary, but it's worth a listen... or more.
Our Rating: 7/10
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