26th March: The Fire Theft - s/t (alternative rock, 2003)
For all of my obscure methods of finding music - detailed and semi-automated; rigorous and thorough, this one threatened to slip through the cracks. I’ve been using the same methods for listening to new music for a number of years now, but I chose to break it when researching my progressive emo playlist, because this one seemed interesting. And given that this is probably the best album I’ve discovered in a long, long time, I’m having a bit of an identity crisis deciding whether or not to reinvent the music research wheel again.
I’m a moderate fan of Sunny Day Real Estate - I like pretty much all of what I’ve heard of them, but nothing to the level where I’d be getting in line to check out a post-relevance side project which got middling reviews. I was expecting to like this, based on the whispers that it continued their mild moves towards progressive music, but I didn’t expect it to become one of my favourite ever albums.
The music here is still centred around the alt-rock tradition. Sure, there are occasional strings, some post-rock interludes, some instrumental tracks and of course the big long ambient outro, but the core of the songwriting is undeniably built from the school of 90's alternative (perhaps that contributed to its middling reception; this was 2003 after all). But where this stands out is in the construction of the melodies. Maybe Jeremy Enigk has just locked into my personal melody fetish and has constructed an entire record of tunes that make me feel things, but I don't know how people aren't raving about these. My god, they're exquisite. They're anthemic and heartfelt in the same breath, pairing impeccably with the backing guitars which at times are big thick stadium rock (not unlike the sorts that Nate Mendel would do with Foo Fighters), but at times are subtle and personable. But every step of the way, every line that Enigk sings is pure gold. It's like he saved every single good melodic idea he ever had just for this album.
The prog influence here is probably a bit overstated, but the diversity in structure does also help - for a genre that's reliant on choruses, they manage to tweak song structures enough to make them varied and interesting. Although you can tell that the melodic songwriting is all cut from the same cloth, the structural songwriting attempts many different formats, leading to an album that's a great listen whilst keeping you interested.
It’s been nearly three years since I last discovered an album that would end up in my illustrious 9+ zone, and it’s become rare to the point where I made a post saying that it’s impossible to reach without a time machine to introduce bands to me at age 14. Speaking of my teenage years, in 2013 I did an entire project on the calendar year 2003, listening to over 300 albums and I was utterly convinced that I’d heard everything worthwhile. Where the hell was this then? It’s been determined to allude me for years, and honestly I’m so glad to have discovered it, because it’s simply been a reminder that there is still great stuff out there, even 8000 albums in. This clearly isn’t for everyone, given the mixed opinions I see about it all over the internet, but oh man it is for me. All my personal musical biases laid out in a melodic, anthemic, grandiose slab of alternative rock. And yes, I’ll probably have to listen to a bit more SDRE now.
9.1 (6th listen)
