poppedmusic

Coastal Grooves

Released 8th August 2011

The only Blood Orange track that I had heard prior to listening to this album was Sutphin Boulevard, which I admittedly took a little while to warm to, though I instantly loved elements of it. This album, it seems, turned out to have exactly the same affect on me. To the point where I still don’t know if I like it or not. There are indeed songs and parts of songs that I really like. Opening track, Forget It, is one of the great tracks to be found on Coastal Grooves. It is quite a chilled out track, with what can only really be described as pretty mixed with gritty when it comes to the music. The guitar riff that rips the track in half is just brilliant. Lyrically though the track is lacking a little; it’s quite repetitive, especially toward the end and I think, quite frankly that the track could perhaps have been maybe a little bit shorter and cut out the somewhat annoyingly dragged out ending.

Complete Failure is certainly not a track that can be said to match its title, well not exactly. It has a haunting feel, the vocals float around in the background, not that I can really decipher most of what the lyrics are, and when I do I end up thinking, what on earth are you on about? Musically though I love this track. I just wish it were someone else singing, I think Likki Li or Sia would do an amazing cover of this. Someone please tell them to! Talking of the vocals some more, I started to think by the following track Instantly Blank (The Goodness), that it is mainly the vocal that I don’t really like throughout the album. It somehow doesn’t sound sincere and at times is really quite irritating. Thank goodness then that this track adds a new element. A much deeper earthier vocal sits behind giving the track a totally different dimension and instantly making this possibly my favourite track on the album. I’m Sorry I Lied, in contrast, is a track that I mostly want to skip, in fact listening to it right now I’m only only about half way in and I’m bored. Despite the fast pace it doesn’t make me want to move, it just makes me want to sleep.

Usually when I listen to an album, the more I listen to it the more I like it. This hasn’t quite happened with Coastal Grooves. Try as I might I don’t enjoy it as a whole. There are certain tracks that I will happily plant in the middle of a playlist but it’s all a bit too samey, There’s not really that much of a change in style or vocal and some parts of songs sound almost exactly the same as others. There are of course a few stand out tracks, which I have already mentioned, but for the most part it all starts to become a little bit “meh” by the time you’ve listened to the album a few times in a row. In fact, I don’t really like to listen to it too many times in a row, which is probably why it’s taken me several weeks to getting around to putting fingers to keys to review it. The best bits seem to all have something in common too, the little break down in tracks, or where something interesting happens in terms of a change of sound, mood or vocal. The Complete Knock suffers similarly to other tracks in being a little too long, in fact it’s over 5 minuites long and the best part of it is the computer noise effects that happen at around 3.50 in and last about 10 seconds.

I was kind of looking forward to hearing this album, especially after I’d started to really enjoy Sutphin Boulevard, but sadly, for the most part it hasn’t quite delivered. I’m not even too sure what I wanted or what I expected but try as I might the majority of the album just doesn’t sit well with me. I totally appreciate the fact that, as always, music is very personal and whilst there are elements I really enjoy, other people are totally going to love this album, others will hate it. I think Blood Orange could well just be the new Marmite.