A third album for a band either establishes them as people you can go to for consistently good music or it’s where they start to decline and their albums become the kind where it would just be smarter to buy the one or two hits from the album off itunes because the rest of the songs are just filler. Interpol's third album Our Love to Admire falls somewhere between both of these categories. With most artists nowadays, to churn out the hits consistently requires a team of song writers, so I credit them with writing their own material and producing two good efforts in Turn on the Bright Lights and Antics, two albums still on my ipod that get played. With the new album, the hits are far and few, with only a select few being noteworthy.
Like previous albums, the first song “Pioneer to the Falls” slowly creeps up on you getting bigger with every note till it hits you with those bombastic sonic guitars (think “Untitled” off of Turn on the Bright Lights). As a plus, on this album, the hooks that are good are nice and sharp and those songs are well crafted. On “The Scale” and “Rest My Chemistry” Interpol are in rare form as these songs just have this great slow dark groove, making them two of the best songs on the album. More than that, they both really capture the sound that has made Interpol distinguishable in the current crop of bands who emulate them, Joy Division or the Chameleons, the last two being bands that Interpol themselves emulate. With this album, being their first major label debut (believe-it-or-not), they have somewhat beefed up their sound a bit adding keyboards, horns, and strings on “Wrecking Ball,” one of the better and more interesting tracks of the album.
Our Love To Admire has it’s ups and downs, there are a few noteworthy songs as listed above. While the remaining tracks are on par with the Interpol sound, the album itself is slightly above average compared to their last two efforts. It’s not the best offering from Interpol, but by no means bad. I think I can give them a second chance on their next album. They’ve been consistent enough for me! |