Islands – Arm’s Way Review
Islands a band out of Montreal known for including members of the band Unicorns (I have procrastinated picking up “Who Will Cut Our Hair When We’re Gone?”). I remember checking out Return to the Sea and ultimately deciding that it wasn’t my thing. I remember checking out a few weeks ago their myspace, just for the sake of it and actually liked what I was hearing. I didn’t check out Arm’s Way around their May release because I wasn’t all into their first album and reviews were less then stellar. I decided to check out the album with an open mind.
I thought the first album was creative but not exactly accessible. I didn’t find myself wanting to listen to it more then a few bits and pieces. Arm’s Way starts off with the Arm with an entertaining hook using Nick Thorburn’s vocals well. They use more entertaining, catchier music and aren’t afraid to use it while yelling angry verses in either dry or clean vocals depending on whatever they feel. They tend to display when they feel and they really get their point across.
I really like most of the songs on the album, they aren’t all great, some feel a little bit too contrived and the more structural, catchier music doesn’t quite match up to the vocals or lyrics. It’s damn entertaining though. I don’t really see a problem with being less creative and toning down the experimentation when it works and it works for me, which is most importantly all that I could care about more. There’s still quite a bit experimentation with the structure and lyrical conjecture to still say this album is pretty good.
Either way, if you place away expectations of the first album and the Unicorns, this album is pretty good on it’s own. It’s still creative and experimental and I can’t fault any band for that.
There’s a lot to this album, most songs are 5 minutes or longer and the Islands manage to keep my attention throughout with some cool intros and use of musical progression to keep me interested all the way throughout. It’s like almost song has an epic ending that I have to witness.
Some of my favorite tracks include Kids Don’t Know Shit, We Swim and In The Rushes.
Rating: 4.5 out of 5
I don’t know what Pitchfork was fussing about but this is a great rock record. In similar fashion other critics seemed to follow Pitchfork’s “opinion” which more seemed like an arbitrary number to just say the album was not as good as the first. Islands still took great risks on everything they do on this album and some people may miss out on a gem.
Kids Don’t Know Shit by Islands
Tags: album
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