Artist – Album: Interpol
- Antics
Released:
27th September 2004
Sounds Like: Interpol (who else?)
Antics is a strange name for an album brought to you by everyone’s favourite New York murk-merchants. There’s little in the way of foolish, outrageous or amusing behaviour in this set – more straight-laced and pained – and, to be honest, it just wouldn’t feel right if there was.
So what’s changed from Turn on the Bright Lights? Comfortingly very little. Interpol continue to trade in punchy rhythms and almost comically bleak sounds, remaining both accessible and weird. Album opener ‘Next Exit’ at first seems strangely stately and un-Interpol-esque, but then if you remember that their debut had begun with the similar elegant ‘Untitled’ it becomes vaguely familiar. Everything is a little more loose and danceable, the production is clearer and the songs have been shorn of any unnecessary fluff, thus avoiding the first album’s slight dip towards the end, but this could still only be an Interpol record.
Lead singer Paul Banks has a brilliant characterful voice despite his gloomy limited range. On ‘Evil’ and ‘Public Pervert’ he possess the cool, detached fascination of an A-grade psycho, like a rock star Dexter, whilst ‘Slow Hands’ and ‘C’mere’ have the fragility of an old gentlemen struggling to retain his composure. These are backed by lyrics such as “can’t you see what you’ve done to my heart” and “the trouble is you’re in love with someone else” and make for a more personal record than Turn on the Bright Lights.
All in all Antics is an only slightly less good follow up to a fine first record, and cements Interpol stance as one of the best rock groups of the 21st Century. I can also confirm that despite now being four albums old, they’ve still never dreamed of getting up to any antics.
Albumaday... rating: 7/10
1. Next
Exit – 3:20
2. Evil
– 3:35
3. Narc
– 4:07
4. Take
You on a Cruise – 4:54
5. Slow
Hands – 3:04
6. Not
Even Jail – 5:46
7. Public
Pervert – 4:40
8. C’mere
– 3:11
9. Length
of Love – 4:06
10. A
Time to Be So Small – 4:50
Listen to ‘C’mere’: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaDw4CAcXVE
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