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Gravenhurst, "Fires In Distant Buildings"
What’s most striking about Fires in Distant Buildingsis the interplay between the album’s themes and its sound on thesurface. The melodies are pretty and the vocals are light and airyand full of harmonies that would make a pop producer proud. The lyrics,on the other hand, cut any pleasant warm fuzzies with a sharp, serratedknife and then hide the body parts under the house. I listened to this record with a co-worker who is mostlyinto Simon and Garfunkel and that sort of thing and to her, theoverwhelmingly macabre and morose lyrics seemed funny and completelyout of place. I have to admit that I’m not sure if they are meant to befunny or not, but they are certainly hard to take seriously with suchpeppy and melodic accompaniment.
Gravenhurst make some of the most well-crafted, guitar-pop musicI've heard all year. It's easy to imagine Gravenhurst making thestadium festival rounds and playing to huge audiences of emotionallyfragile but picky kids, if it weren't for the lyrics. In fact thelyrics are what turn this well-made rock record into a somethingdecidedly more dubious.
Without paying muchattention to the words, the album’s second track is an almostdelightful stroll through the park. It’s only once the brain hasprocessed the lines “To understand the killer/I must become the killer”and “Now I’ve tasted hatred I want more” that Gravenhurst’s true naturebecomes clear.
While the album loses me towards theend, the first few tracks are pure subversive pop bliss. The record isfilled with vocal hooks that snare the conscious mind while rippingapart the subconscious. It’s still a weird record for Warp to beputting out, but its certainly one worth tracking down if just to beable to put some of these songs on at a party and make people say “didhe really just say something about ‘bodies floating in the river?’
