Windmill – Every Last Windmill Shall Fall

FCC Clean!
Influences: Beatles, Floyd (lyrics, spacey sounds) Radiohead, Beck, many, many others
Band seems confused as to what it wants to do on the album overall, but taken individually, many songs really work. Album is very top-heavy: first half of the album has great variety, successful incorporation of varied elements. The back part bottoms out: songs blur together into a generic, sloppy mess. The second part is more experimental, but not successfully so. Listen to it and decide for yourself!

1’s good in the catchy, poppy way they probably intend it to be. 3’s a quality piece in a very different, Floydian way – nice contrast. I really like 6 as well.
Check out 7/8 for slow, pretty songs. 8 is more experimental and pretty cool. 9 also adds variety in a cool way – threshold between first and second half.

All time references = time remaining

1. * (2:11) Fast, upbeat, driving, song. Rockin’ guitar riff intro into some nice keyboard work. Singers alternates, one practically speaking, the other’s voice not great, but it works. Sounds almost like their version of Bowie. Nice, clear guitar outro.
2. (3:37) Mid-tempo, poetic imagery, yearning lyrics. Acoustic guitar/spoken word intro. Keyboard/electric guitar gradually come in. Picks up/ drums at 2:40.Distorted spoken word.
3. * (6:35) Slower, culls styles from many diverse bands. Long, but enough variety to keep things interesting. Guitar/bass intro. Nice guitar picking throughout. Supporting background harmonies, sometimes Beatlesque. Synthesizer work later on. Cool Beck-like spoken word @ 2:25.
4. (3:55) Up-tempo guitar and drums, with distant, slower vocal harmonies. More Beatles-pop at times. :25 – 10s of nice keyboard, 15s of talking, noise, dogs barking, leads into #5.
5. (3:47) Has lead-in from #4, but stands alone. Fast drums and bass move song at first. Slow, steady, Wilco-like singing. Choppy, driving, Franz Ferdinand-riffs in the middle contrast with subsequent. Pretty piano/electronic.
6. * (1:02) One minute guitar-only piece. Quite nice, actually. First struck me as sounding like one of Hendrix’s slow songs (Angel, perhaps). Great sound-bed potential too!
7. * (3:42) Slow harmonica intro over equally slow guitar leads into high, airy, female vocals with male voice in background – all quite pretty. Same guitar throughout. Male vocals gain prominence/equality by middle. Last minute like intro w/ harp.
8. (2:29) Slow acoustic guitar-picking. Followed by very high female (boy’s choir?) voice over a crescendo of rock guitar/drums – works for a cool effect. Nice, simple, lyrics.
9. * (3:29) Hand-clapping intro with electronic/electric guitar soon thereafter. Sets up like a Tom Waits song, but gets more upbeat. Nice, subtle bass work in background. Clear, defiant singing as is the mode (The Strokes, FF) – doesn’t fit perfectly, but still works fine.

10. (3:28) More traditional, full-band intro sets up for a mediocre, somewhat generic pop/rock song w/ equally mediocre lyrics. Not bad, but weaker than other songs. Like #4, last 25s set up for next song w/ nice acoustic guitar/ firework sounds (?).
11. (7:15) A song with great potential, but disappointing. Continuation of nice acoustic guitar from end of 10 - steady, pretty, mid/slow w/ faint fireworks sounds in background until 5:10 when band comes in w/ a cool drum/bass line. Changes direction (deteriorates, disappoints) with synthesized brass and slow, airy vocals. 35s of noise at 2:55 leads to reggae drums line and short, strummed electric guitar with keyboard/more noise. 25s static fade at end. Give it a listen and see if you think it works!
12. (5:27) Slow, detached, ambient - distorted guitar and static. Faint speaking/orating underneath. Singing at 2:30, sounds like someone half-heartedly, slightly drunkenly singing a Christmas song. Vocal harmonies w/ female singer for last minute. Mediocre all around. 10s fade.
13. (2:17) Bell intro, band comes in after a few seconds. Some interesting electronic sounds and drum machine work along with non-word singing and a very faint repeated line. Not bad, nothing too special.