Artist: Keane
Label: Island Records
Release date: May 4, 2012
Length: 45:08
Rating: 2.9/5
Been craving something musically lighter for once, but still well made? Leave the experimental stuff and the musical treats that the other excellent members of the RockLine crew serve up daily aside, and as an intro to this carefree hour with Keane, read the lines below about their new record.
In Slovenia, we know Keane mostly for the radio hit from their debut ‘Hopes and Fears’, the song Everybody’s Changing. In the UK, though, the band does a bit better than that. The record under review is already their fifth album in a row to hit number one on the British charts. Forget Coldplay or U2, let alone the more alternative Radiohead: of the ”right-here-right-now” bands, Keane hold the crown. Only music giants like ABBA, Led Zeppelin and The Beatles are ahead of them. If you know the British music scene and industry a little better, that’s hardly surprising. For (that kind of) success you have to be very British, or more precisely very English, and you can’t stray too far from traditional patterns anywhere. And that’s exactly what Keane are. They’re a softer offshoot of an eminent and varied palette of beloved British musicians; let me just name the most obvious role models and influences: U2, Nick Drake, Blur, Oasis, David Bowie, The Beatles, Radiohead, Pet Shop Boys, Queen, etc. But too much national cliché can come back to bite you. All we need is a look across the pond. There Keane have no success worth mentioning, just like Robbie Williams, The Stone Roses, The Smiths, Oasis and Blur before them, and to some extent Queen too, etc. The story clearly repeats itself. Let’s leave the numbers and the (musically) irrelevant ”squabbling” about megalomania and success aside and dive into the record Strangeland (which might just show us a few parallels with classic British soundscapes).
Keane formed in 1997 on the southeast coast of the British island. The head, heart and engine of the outfit is multi-instrumentalist Tim Rice-Oxley, who also writes most of the songs and lyrics (a couple of months after Keane formed, Coldplay singer Chris Martin offered him the keyboard slot in his own band, but he turned it down for the sake of his own group). The band also includes Tom Chaplin, a singer with an angelically rich voice, drummer Richard Hughes, and bassist and guitarist Jesse Quin. Unlike most (pop-)rock bands, which use the guitar as their main instrument, Keane’s music rests mainly on keyboards. To date they’ve released four studio albums, two live albums and a few EPs. They’re part of the vast and varied British middle-of-the-road music world. Even though they aren’t a manufactured band, they constantly flirt with commercial, market-driven tricks. For now they still stay safely on the artistic side. On first listen, the comparison with Coldplay is unavoidable. Both build their music on catchy melodies, except that Coldplay are far more innovative and often approach making music much more ambitiously (Brian Eno, experimental references, a worldly outlook -> the view from the island,…). And that’s exactly what Keane are missing on ‘Strangeland’. These are excellent individuals with first-rate technical chops who keep locking themselves into the comfort zone of stereotypical middle-of-the-road pop tunes. Sometimes you get the feeling they want to play Eurovision (as it looks today). They have potential, but to write themselves into history they’ll have to change their approach. ‘Strangeland’ is a correct and coherent piece of work, but monotonous, without surprises (not enough waves, not enough energy -> a flat line) and far from anything outstanding. It offers musical templates chewed over a hundred times and wishy-washy songwriting ideas. This is (mostly) syrupy music ”without balls”. Music suited to the reception desks of public offices and clinics, and to teenagers who think they’re seventy years old. Music that doesn’t weigh on you and, on some level, rests your ears. Sure, even that is welcome every once in a while, and that’s the first reason to read this and later listen to the record, but Keane definitely want more than just that. Radio already spins far too much ”radio-friendly” music, i.e. background music. Unobtrusive, indistinct, ”without oomph”. The song structures are too predictable and too often fall back on clichéd proportions. That doesn’t mean everything is bad. The album has excellent (sentimental) moments, plenty of songs are lyrically strong and carry some kind of spirit or emotion. The keyboards are inventive in places too, but overall there’s no positive aggression to be felt, no radical musical cuts into this lovely, quasi-fairytale whole. Compared to earlier albums the band has still taken a step forward, for which we mostly have to thank producer Dan Grech-Marguerat, who despite his youth has worked with the very cream of the British and global popular alternative music scene (Radiohead, Moby, The Kooks, Lana Del Rey, Hurts, The Vaccines (his work on their debut is also why he was picked to produce ‘Strangeland’)). Unlike its predecessors, the album is much more dynamic and varied, and it stands out especially for its conceptual setup. The album will appeal mostly to Keane fans, while it won’t win them many new admirers. The record sounds like a kind of memorial to past (love) relationships.
There are twelve songs on the album, and the bonus or deluxe version adds four more. Opener You Are Young is a light, warm, flowing and very listenable song with the obligatory ”ooooo” singing. You get the feeling the keyboards were borrowed from some Coldplay track, with a good Bono impersonator on vocals. Still, the song is meaningful and cleverly written. It’s a kind of ode to youth. Youth is a gift, so let’s use it and experience it to the fullest. A young person has their whole life ahead of them, so some current problems shouldn’t stop them on life’s road. Carpe Diem and no fear. The first single and second track on the album, called Silenced By The Night, carries on with the softness of the opener and an uplifting, dynamic landscape that you could easily pin on some pop band. The song is built on repeating piano sequences. It contains interesting, at times clumsy metaphors that still come across as endearing (”If I am a river, you are the ocean”). It’s about a couple re-establishing their relationship, their own world. Relationship rehab. The problem in a relationship is only fixable if both people work at it. Trust isn’t the issue, it’s chemistry. The song peaks in a gorgeous ”echo” passage where it opens up and the story clears: the solution is near: ”Cause baby, I’m not scared of this world when you’re here…”. The third track, Disconnected, is closely tied to the next one, Watch How You Go, and works as its thematic predecessor. A musically lively song (with a few outstanding stretches toward the end) that still sticks to established rhythms. At moments you get the feeling the same song is playing for the third time. Lyrically, the writer again touches on partnership. This time it’s the beginning of the end. A cold wind has blown into the relationship, the (love) affair is nearing its final hour. The song probes the meaning of trust and loss. The story finally unravels in the next track, an elegy with a classic piano intro, Watch How You Go. The couple splits, but each wishes the other well. The motto: memories fade, but moments and feelings remain.
Sovereign Light Café wrestles with the link between past and present. The nostalgic sound blends perfectly with the worldly-wise lyrics (e.g.: ”But you’ve got nothing to hide, / you come to change who you really are / You can get a big house and a faster car / You can run away boy but you won’t go far”). A song that’s strongly emotional and plays a special role in the band’s history. It ties them back to their beginnings as a group and also sings of youthful loves. All of that is embodied for them by the southeast English coast, especially the little town of Bexhill-on-Sea and its Sovereign Light Café. A song with strong local color, but first and foremost the view of someone who wants to be back in the old days with their loved one(s), or at least to summon them up again on some level and recreate it all with new life experience. The best song on the album. It’s followed by the lively, bouncy On The Road, which stands out sharply from most of the album with its musical dynamics. The song ”claims” that we humans are fellow travelers in life whether we like it or not, so helping each other just makes the shared road easier. The next one, the melodramatic The Starting Line, picks up from the previous song. It moves to a personal level and deals with help in times of trouble and the tendency of love to run in cycles (”Some find it easy / Some will never know / You think you’ve done your journey / Then you stumble and find that there’s such / a long way to go”). Relationships between people are complicated. Even when some things hurt, they have to be overcome and we have to help each other (”Forget the ghosts that make you old before your time…”). The song is defined musically by bell-like ”inserts” and relaxed piano accompaniment. The next one, Black Rain, is defined by a pulsing, organic dance beat in the background and a melancholic atmosphere. The song is calm, quiet, at times even eerie. It captures feelings of emptiness, loneliness and depression (”If you’ve got love / You better hope that that’s enough”).
Neon River has an opening that even M83 wouldn’t be ashamed of. Neon, spacey, echoing effects pervade a song that tells the eternal story of differing values and approaches to how you live and what gives life meaning (the story: the girl wants to conquer the world, while the guy couldn’t care less about success, career and the allure of life in that direction). Day Will Come is a song that carries you away. Pronounced drums time the song perfectly and give it a dynamic look. The song is full of zeal and pours out hope. After hard times in life, better and brighter ones always come (just as the sun always shines after the rain). The second-to-last song on the album, In Your Own Time (surrender to the moment, things will sort themselves out in time), continues in the same vein. The song has an interesting structure and stands out from the rest on that count. Chaplin’s rich vocals, with their rapid shifts in pitch and speed, shine here too, especially in the chorus. Exceptional vocal potential. The sound imaginatively reminds me of sirens singing. A whiff of the sea gets stronger and stronger toward the end of the album. In the closing track it comes fully into its own, right in the title: Sea Fog. An acoustic and sensual ballad that speaks fatalistically about surrendering to the flow of life, while on the other hand also encouraging a healthy curiosity about it. With the help of a choir, Chaplin conjures up hard-to-define feelings that carry depressive, soothing and joyful shades of life alike. An ending that fits the album, but is no surprise by any means.
Are we any closer to an answer as to why this album is so typically British and the artist of English blood? Definitely. Gray, depressive and melancholic tones run through the whole record, which is typical of English musical tradition. Climate metaphors can be found everywhere (especially in the lyrics), and you can ”smell” the sea at every other step. The songs have strong local color and even refer to real English places. You can even detect a pinch of English humor. Nostalgia and heritage are among the album’s guiding threads, which today is one of the main traits of the former monumental British empire (although these are different levels – personal:political – you can’t overlook it, at least on a structural and genealogical level). The songs are mostly classically structured and draw on the rich heritage of various British rock matadors.
With ‘Strangeland’, Keane have further cemented their presence on the British market, but for anything more they’ll have to change their philosophy of making music, or at least their approach. I already said in the intro that these are musicians capable of bigger milestones. Sadly, for now they aren’t hinting at that, and I think they’ll stick to the tried-and-tested way of working in the future too. But it’s not all that bad: every now and then you ”hit the spot” with lighter pop music that doesn’t weigh on you and lets you get something else done while it plays, be it everyday chores or work obligations. Something that fills the void. Sadly the album doesn’t grab you enough for people to really dedicate themselves to it and discover something valuable in it (which it undoubtedly has). Maybe this very write-up will change that, though don’t expect any musical or even life-changing enlightenment.
On October 29, Keane are playing Hala Tivoli – Val 202 is putting together a special program for its 40th anniversary. More info here.
Lineup
Tom Chaplin – vocals, acoustic guitar
Tim Rice-Oxley – piano, synthesizer, backing vocals
Richard Hughes – drums, percussion, backing vocals
Jesse Quin – bass, electric guitar, backing vocals
Production
Dan Grech-Marguerat
Track list
1. You Are Young
2. Silenced By The Night
3. Disconnected
4. Watch How You Go
5. Sovereign Light Café6. On The Road
7. The Starting Line
8. Black Rain
9. Neon River
10. Day Will Come
11. In Your Own Time
12. Sea Fog
