Saturday, January 21, 2006

Hello Blue

Hello Blue - Celebrate

I meant to pick up this CD when I was back at my parents house in Minneapolis this past summer, but didn't end up buying it until I returned there again after Christmas. I really wish I had picked it up earlier, because it has found its way into the car stereo as soon as I got home on the 31st and it hasn't left. I have been listening to Minneapolis's Hello Blue and their CD What It Takes To Wake Up the entire time.

This CD is now firmly in my top 10 for 2005. Number 8 or 9, at least.

This track is a good representation of what the rest of the CD offers: excellent indie rock, with a little shoegazer tossed in for good measure. It kind of has a Sunny Day Real Estate feel to it or Static Prevails era Jimmy Eat World. This song actually wouldn't have sounded out of place on the Bloc Party CD actually, especially the guitar work in the second half of the song. The production quality has that great home studio charm to it, but what if this were slicked up in a big time studio like the Silent Alarm? I'd like to hear that, but I think I like it the way it is.

The song opens with the band raiding the percussion closet before it gets down to business. fun. The slightly dissonant open guitar chords cascade in and the song takes off with the words "Celebrate", which also happens to be the only decipherable word besides the question everyone has been trying to figure out, "Why do all the good things/happen to such bad people?". These guys manage to stretch out one short sentence into a long verse, favoring chord structure over rhythm (while the guitars, accompanied by the drums, texture the song rhythmically), creating a nice unique effect.

The band uses the studio well with layers of vocals dropping in and out over each other, creating a nice surrounding effect. The controlled chaos of the drums, bass, and guitar underneath these vocals is just awesome - the ride cymbal just barely keeps it all from falling apart.

The second half of the song goes into instrumental territory and not a drop of energy is lost, as the end of each section is broken apart and then pushed forward by the drums, creating a very groovy effect. And at the end like finding a second toy in a cracker jack box comes the layers of feedback, which everyone loves.

Hear more Hello Blue on their myspace page.

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