Overview: No Blues is an indie record from an indie band who have been around the block. Los Campesinos! are established songwriters, and it shows. These tracks are carefully crafted indie rock concoctions. Guitar and bass provide the heart of the sound, but it’s the vocals that provide the soul. The lead vocalist is flamboyant and passionate with his delivery, but never too over the top. The band provides nice choral backing vocals that add a lot of color to the sound. There is something amiss on No Blues, though, because these songs sure do seem to blend together. Part of the blame is on the production job; this album is simply mixed and produced very poorly, causing the songwriting to take less effect. The other part of the blame needs to be put on the songwriting, though. This is too safe. The sound has been done many times before and they just don’t include enough ideas into each track. This album was more appealing at first, but the allure fades quickly.
Can you please review RDGLDGRN’s debut album.
No Blues? Listen to the lyrics guys, the last song’s about throwing yourself off a bridge! Just don’t understand what you’re talking about with the production at all, sounds pretty well defined and layered well enough tbh. Wish you’d talk about the songs more, not everyone really cares about production (you may be right about it, I probably dont hear it as I like it so much) as much as how good some of the tunes are.
I think you guys would really get into some of their earlier work. They have some very creative and playful lyrics. This didn’t really do too much for me either. Love the cover art/general vibe they’re trying to go for though. I just didn’t find the songs all that memorable or catchy.
guys thank you for reviewing this album. i personally did not enjoy No Blues upon first listen, but after sitting down with it i grew to love it. production never seemed to bother me since this is an indie rock album & i knew what i was going to get coming into it. Now do i agree that they’re some stinkers on No Blues, but tracks like “For Flotsam”, “Cemetery Gaits”, “Avocado, Baby”, “Let It Spill” & and one of my favorite tracks of the year “What Death Leaves Behind” more than make of for them. Oh & one last thing… PLEASE REVIEW CHILDISH GAMBINO’S NEW ALBUM. i’d like to see your takes on what i believe will be will end up being my hip hop album of the year.
arghh how did I miss this going out? I love LC!
I really liked this album and the production didn’t really bother me, perhaps because I have really liked this band for a long time. I have the lyric book that was available with the pre-order of the album and it made me more aware of the message of the songs but then perhaps thats a sign of the level of production of the album in that I actually had to go read what was actually being sung. What I really like is how awash this is with football(soccer) references and that they actually work! I’ve rarely seen sport references translate into music without a general feeling of naffness.
I would have to side with Tom on this one, I think a lot of the songs on this album are very strong and make up for the things that don’t quite work here.
I’m not sure if you guys picked this one because of past nagging to review one of their previous albums or not but the last one record I suggested you review was the “Twilight Sad” which also had a split opinion. Rest assured I’m working hard on finding the next divisive record.
This is one of my favourite albums of the year. I love the lyrics, the production doesn’t bother me much.
Waaay too much production talk here. I think you could’ve stated your case on that in a sentence or two.