ALBUM REVIEWS |
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The Alarm 'In the Poppy Fields' (Snapper) |
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With all the urgency of an Eyeballkid update, The Alarm has released their first studio album in over ten years. Now I have to be honest - I can't remember any of the hits they had ten years ago or more. The promo blurb on the album's cover proudly trumpets their 14 hit singles, seven hit albums, five million sales -yahdah yah; playing to over 210,000 people -ho hum all well and good -can anyone name me one of their songs? Without checking Google that is. Well maybe one or two of you can, but it would still require a monumental comeback album to blast them back onto my radar. 'In the Poppy Fields' seems to be divided into two quite different halves - tracks one to six are quite rocky in a Manics-type vein, including the unsuccessful attempt to fake the exuberance of youth on '45 RPM', which they had released as a single under the pseudonym The Poppyfields. The second half of the album is all slow and moody stuff, the sort of drivel bands like Coldplay and Travis bore everyone with only more so. It is all well made, well produced and listenable enough, however something is missing - what the French would call a certain "I don't know what." Fair enough, I rarely like music this mainstream, but I can still separate the wheat from the chaff. This is the chaff. Morrissey's recent comeback is therefore the wheat and believe me I have never been a Morrissey fan. Credit it where it is due, the tracks 'Federal Motor Voter' and 'Trafficking' make up a pretty good five minutes in the middle of the album, but that is not enough to save it. Maybe if this was say the seventh Alarm album in the last decade instead of the first such mediocrity could be forgiven. words: Harry Harris |
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