Broken Bells – Meyrin Fields EP
While in LA, I stayed with a sweet dude named Billy who played Broken Bells’ self-titled debut album in the drive all the way from LA to Hacienda Heights, and I was surprised such a great band had escaped my notice. I haven’t listened to a lot of Danger Mouse, but I did used to have a special place in my heart for the Shins (of whom frontman James Mercer makes up the other half of Broken Bells) back when I was just a 16-year-old emotional teenager watching The Garden State.
But now, fortunately or unfortunately, however you want to look at it, I am no longer reduced to a hormonal sad little girl when I listen to good music, and I’m glad I’m finally on the bandwagon for this band in particular since they definitely have the groove, as heard in instrumental songs like “An Easy Life” which features wobbly guitar riffs and a kind of back and forth rhythm that makes you just want to bounce around where ever you happen to be when you listen to it. Their EP Meyrin Fields, which came out back in March, also features the single of the same name which features quirky robot noises and beeps in conjunction with Mercer’s falsetto vocals singing in apocalyptic warning against the refuses of modern day living: “This city/Your culture/Your modern day suffering/Is over/So what if I love it/I can’t help it/That’s all” followed by “Will someone measure this moron now?/I’m back again in this one light town/I cut the tie and I don’t have to rely on nothing no more.” So what’s he trying to say, that the world is going to shit and we should just accept it? Is this just plain nihilism or is there something deeper to these lyrics? I think the latter, but you tell me.
And one of my favourites from Broken Bells just for good measure:
