WE HAVE NEW FREAKIN’ RA RA RIOT TRACKS, PEOPLE!

And what better excuse to get back to blogging than that?

There’s a whole host of snippets and previews from their highly-anticipated (certainly by WN) second album, due to hit our various media players on 24^th August, over on their website. I’ll throw together a post later with all the lovely teaser material that’s become available on various blogs and whatnot but in the meantime feast your eyes and ears on the lovely moving pictures and noises available on their homepage. Enjoy!

I was not going to blog about this gig, because I realise this site is on the verge of becoming the Los Campesinos! Squealy Fangirl Blog but fuck me, tonight was IMMENSE and simply demands an account.

If you want a brief opinion and then to move on: THEY NAILED IT. Every single song. NAILED. IT.

And if you want a slightly more comprehensive version? You’ll get every word after the JUMP!…

Spotified playlist available here so you can tell all your friends that you were there when we all know your dirty little secret – you were at home eating sweet chilli flavoured Walkers and watching Eastenders. You should be ashamed.

At one point mid-set tonight, Gareth Campesinos! begged the crowd not to make them ‘get real jobs’. If tonight was anything to go by, they need never have a real job ever again. Songs from all their 4 releases were performed with hectic energy and incredibly tight musicianship and the crowd in turn went simply mental, the floor bounding and thrashing about at every available opportunity and singing back lyrics as if their plaid-clad and skinny-jeaned lives depended on it. Even the numerous balconies were rocking out. It really did feel like something was turning for the self-confessed ‘middling UK indie band’, and that they could be about to Break Out, big style. Or at least, I hope so. Certainly, triumph and celebration were in the air both sides of the barriers.

Particular highlights were a frantic version of Death to Los Campesinos!, a smack-you-in-the-face-and-run-away My Year in Lists, a completely cathartic You! Me! Dancing! during which only the bodies of the cold and dead inside were still, and a rousing Sweet Dreams, Sweet Cheeks to close the main set, during which Gareth disappeared into the mass of bodies on the floor (how in the hell does he keep singing when he does that?) and Neil Campesinos! also indulged in a spot of crowd surfing as arms and fingers were flung aloft to ‘One blink for yes/Two blinks for no/Sweet dreams, sweet cheeks/We leave alone’. Well worth a mention too were the perfectly pitched and turned The Sea is a Good Place to Think of the Future, which I think may be creeping up to become my favourite LC! tune, an absolutely banging choice of encore performance of This is How You Spell “HAHAHA, We Destroyed the Hopes and Dreams of a Generation of Faux-Romantics!”, and a version of We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed that has never felt so true.

Everything was just spot-on, from the choice and sequence of tracks, to the pace of the performance, from the wild shapes Gareth was throwing (he is bendy!), to the obvious excitement of the entire band to be where they were and doing what they were doing (and due credit must also go to the crowd who, whilst rowdy, were never anything less than friendly, enthusiastic and, as Gareth pointed out, very polite).

No, none of Los Campesinos! need to worry about getting a ‘real job’ any time soon. But Thom Yorke needs to watch his back if that Best Blog award doesn’t turn up by next Monday. He can’t say he wasn’t warned.

Horchata

Boston (Ladies of Cambridge)

Cousins

Run

The Kids Don’t Stand a Chance

Actually, you know what? The above were my highlights this guy seems to have recorded at least a bit of each song so go have a browse and enjoy at your leisure.

Track listing after the JUMP!

Done All Wrong – Black Rebel Motorcycle Club

You Are Mine – Mutemath

I Know – Fiona Apple

To Be Alone With You – Sufjan Stevens

I Want a New Drug – Glen Phillips

Distractions – Zero 7

Strange and Beautiful – Aqualung

Drink Deep – Laura Veirs

All This Time – Sara Watkins

Crowing – Toad the Wet Sprocket

I Will Follow You Into the Dark – Death Cab for Cutie

Skinny Love – Bon Iver

Magpie to the Morning – Neko Case

4:35am – Gemma Hayes

Eyes on Fire – Blue Foundation

Breathe Me – Sia

Glorybox – Portishead

Los Campesinos! have Been Through Some Shit, and now they are going to Work It Out. Previous limited-release We are Beautiful, We are Doomed showed the band moving in an darker, more reflective direction and Romance is Boring continues this beautiful, affecting downward spiral of emotion.

Full review (and videos) after the JUMP!

Honesty, sometimes brutal, has always been a hallmark of Gareth Campesinos!’s writing and he continues with this unabated on the new record. He covers the full gamut of subject matter, from good sex to bad, religion, fear, hope, and everything in between. The frank, bleak and somehow redeeming The Sea is a Good Place to Think About the Future is probably the highlight of the record, bearing some of the most searingly open lyrics I have ever come across (‘I grabbed hold of her wrists and my hand closed from tip to tip/I said you’ve taken the  diet too far, you’ve got to let it slip/But she’s not eating again’) as well as boasting some nicely understated orchestration. As such, it grabs you about the throat and jerks a massive emotional response from your gut with its talk of eating disorders, helplessness, hopelessness and the oblivious continuation of life. I’m making it sound like a dirge, but really it’s just incredible and I could write about it for hours, so I’m going to stop now. The close of Straight in at 101 is a particular lyrical triumph, dripping with the tongue-in-cheek distortion of youth’s preoccupation with its own ‘tragedies’ (‘I phone my friends and family to gather round the television; the talking heads count down the most heart-wrenching break-ups of all time. Imagine the great sense of waste, the indignity, the embarrassment, when not a single one of that whole century was mine.’)

There are still sights of the ‘old’, ebullient Campesinos!, particularly on tracks such as Romance is Boring, though again there’s more bite to the lyrics than previously and (PLAN A) shines with desperate aggression as both the vocals and instruments truly let rip. What’s going on in most of these songs is just too big to try and wrestle into any kind of rhyming scheme so, more often than not, rhyme is done away with altogether, with rhythm and tone utilised as impressive replacements. There are some seriously impressive licks and melodies on show here too, from the slightly video-gamey opening of I Warned You: Do Not Make an Enemy of Me, the glock and brass-accented line of There are Listed Buildings or the mid song electric screeches of RIB. There’s less mania about the compositions, with the band no longer feeling they need to prove themselves by playing every instrument within arm’s reach on every track (though previously I had considered this part of their charm). They now seem confident enough in their ability and scope to lay off the layering a bit and be more selective, and it works perfectly on this collection of songs.

Los Campesinos! are a band blossoming out of youth and settling into the dark, twisty and awkward world of adulthood with courage and some great tunes – and long may they continue to grow.

WN Rating: 8/10

Here’s a few of vids of the songs mentioned above for your melodic information…

The Sea is a Good Place to Think of the Future

Romance is Boring (MENTAL video)

There are Listed Buildings

Enjoy some choice photos – steal and I’ll break your fingers, blah, blah, blah…

Full set after the JUMP!

…I think the day may have finally come when I need to just give in and get a flickr account.

Enjoy!