- Audio CD (10 April 2006)
- Number of Discs: 1
- Label: V2
- ASIN: B000E5KJT8
- Other Editions: Audio CD
- Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 43,500 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
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Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
They say there’s no prizes for coming second place, but on their debut album, Semifinalists make experimental sonics and an eccentric, outsider stance sound like a weird kind of victory. Sound scientists in the questing spirit of Grandaddy, Secret Machines or the Flaming Lips, this London-based film school trio craft magic realist rock epics that beneath their broiling surface of neon synthesiser and crunchy guitar, conceal oddly touching emotional epiphanies. "Show The Way" opens as an Eels-like lullaby that asks "Are you sad?" over wisps of synth before being rent in two by a guitar riff that soars in like a cannonball, while "Let’s Kill This" blossoms with layered vocals and the distant shimmer of bowed guitar. Semifinalists is an occasionally lo-fi affair, and one that pointedly lacks the wondrous orchestral grandeur that’s grown to define the likes of the Flaming Lips. But songs like "You Said" and the blip-laden "Short Acoustic Song" excel at building an elegant, symphonic racket out of defiantly no-tech tools, and even at their most basic and unadorned, Semifinalists write songs with a quiet beauty it’s hard to deny. --Louis Pattison
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
Semifinalists do that old thing of mixing glowing harmonies and a pepped up pop suss to discordant synthesized orchestration and in your face slabs of wholesome guitar noise. They recall Granddaddy, The Flaming Lips, Death Cab for Cutie and Sheer, though it's entirely possible that I'm the only one who remembers them. Their lo-fi passivity and skew riff imagination also bring to mind bands like The Pastels. If I am making all this sound like a bad thing then I apologise. While this album is a touch sketchy and often too idiosyncratic for it's own good there is no little talent and warped intelligence here. And some of the tunes would make a sloth pogo.
Chris Steele-Nicholsons reedy falsetto twitters over Casio Keyboards, recorders, Hammond organ, xylophone with the occasional brush of acoustic guitar and/or disquieting eruptions of guitar noise and/or percussion. Adriana Alba adds more lustrous harmonic vocal backing, but the real eye opener is Ferry Gouw whose vocals though utilised sparingly are a genuinely intense manic yelp, which just for added effect are pushed up higher in the mix.
The album suffers to some extent because the stand out track - "Origin Song"- happens to open the album. This song intersperses the diverse vocal styles of the band to superb effect. "Show The Way" which was the first single from the album progresses from slight beginnings to scuffed euphoria. Current single "You Said" goes quiet. Loud, quiet, semi loud back to quiet via a very loud bit. It works unexpectedly well and segues into the lush effortlessly harmonic "D.C". But tracks like the limp and ephemeral "HWY 100" compromises the albums gauzy momentum , all be it briefly before the more traditional power pop delights of "I Saw You In the Hall" and the introverted symphonies of "Upstream " and "Several To Many" .
Along with bands like My Latest Novel and The Mystery Jets The Semifinalists are reinvigorating a British music scene that was teetering on the verge of post Ferdinand / Kaiser Chiefs parody. Time will tell if they have any long lasting effect and are part of the first foaming cascades of a cleansing wave of talent. Best for know to enjoy this album and hope that more and better is yet to come.
Chris Steele-Nicholsons reedy falsetto twitters over Casio Keyboards, recorders, Hammond organ, xylophone with the occasional brush of acoustic guitar and/or disquieting eruptions of guitar noise and/or percussion. Adriana Alba adds more lustrous harmonic vocal backing, but the real eye opener is Ferry Gouw whose vocals though utilised sparingly are a genuinely intense manic yelp, which just for added effect are pushed up higher in the mix.
The album suffers to some extent because the stand out track - "Origin Song"- happens to open the album. This song intersperses the diverse vocal styles of the band to superb effect. "Show The Way" which was the first single from the album progresses from slight beginnings to scuffed euphoria. Current single "You Said" goes quiet. Loud, quiet, semi loud back to quiet via a very loud bit. It works unexpectedly well and segues into the lush effortlessly harmonic "D.C". But tracks like the limp and ephemeral "HWY 100" compromises the albums gauzy momentum , all be it briefly before the more traditional power pop delights of "I Saw You In the Hall" and the introverted symphonies of "Upstream " and "Several To Many" .
Along with bands like My Latest Novel and The Mystery Jets The Semifinalists are reinvigorating a British music scene that was teetering on the verge of post Ferdinand / Kaiser Chiefs parody. Time will tell if they have any long lasting effect and are part of the first foaming cascades of a cleansing wave of talent. Best for know to enjoy this album and hope that more and better is yet to come.
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
It would be impossible to deny the beauty in some of these songs.. just buy this!
5 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
... and it's everything I wanted, expected and hoped for! It's got intensity, beauty and imagination and makes me want to sing, dance and cry all at the same time :) If this band don't make some kind of significant impact it'll be a crime!! A+
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