Friday, May 11, 2007

Mew: 'The Soaring Kites'


Mew [left2right]: johan wohlert (former bass), jonas bjerre, silas graae, and bo madsen



Huh… what is this song?![frowned in disgust]
That was exactly what came across my head first time I heard “Comforting Sounds” by Mew back in early 2003. I got a little suspicious of this sound actually. Hell yea, curiosity kills!! But here in my case, music curious me, always..

But as I listened and listened and surfed their official site, played their media player put on there [back years before, it was a complete tracks], I became really relate to the sounds, really amusing and comforting [indeed]. Actually their songs played important part in my striving for the Bachelor-Thesis [hovering at the lab-comp accompanied with the MEW-sic], which was really dreadful [what’s not!].

Yes!
I eventually and finally… bought the album, ‘FRENGERS: not quite friends but not quite strangers’ [actually this is their third albums in independent but their first in ‘so-called-major’]. It suites the whole album really [album title and the songs in it], because once you listen to them, you’ll feel kinda related to it but need so many times to really know them piece by piece. So, indeed it is… not quite a friend, but at the exact time, not quite a stranger too.

Two years after [2005], they came back with the new album, new kind of sounds [but still not eliminating the ‘chocking-mellowdy], and surprisedlly, in mid 2006, a breaking news of someone leaving the band for the sake of fatherhood [congratulation anyway. Family’s number one, yea!!].

Despite of all ‘behind the scenes’ of this new record, I must say that this band is really doing something, [I dare say] smart and different.
Indeed. They are, just like proverb said, “the ones who made a difference by withstanding the indifference

So to please my curiosity of, what this new album of Mew is like and will it be an outstanding album like before, I bought the CD of “Mew… and The Glass Handed Kites”. I also kinda worried of possibility that this album was gonna kill me [in the exact meaning] for its boring and lame tunes.
But once I thumped the play button, I was drowned into a surrealist-outer-world. And I was just noticed that the 12 first songs in the album are flowing to one another. It’s like a never ending story. It’s like you never know what will happen next, you’re haunted by curiosity disease of “will it end at the next second?” or “what will the next song’ sound like?”. Each of the song stands independently, but flowing. It’s really different when you listen to the song one by one, randomly and independently then listen to the whole full album constantly.

I can say I was glad that I didn’t die for any boring and lame tunes of this album [since it doesn’t have any boring and lame tunes]. It’s a never ending joyfulness listening to the sounds, over and over and over again.
And I am still glad for that.

One thing that really Mew [I must say that], is the way the music is written. It’s kinda dark, painful, complicating, melancholic-sentiment but it also has spirit and hope in it and hell yea, still you will get a never ending wonder in the meaning of the lyrics [I never really get the lyrics from their early works exactly]. And the high-pitchy-vulnerable voice of Jonas brings you to the outer-space, as always.

A complex vibe in simplicity of comforting sounds”, that’s how to describe Mewsic really in one breath.

You can never portrait them in rock mainstream angle or pop song or worst… a dance-mix. Because they are not in any genre ever created, if that explains the reason.

I myself tend to relate them to the world of ‘alternative-indie-sound’, because whatever it is, their music is a fresh cool breeze from Scandinavia. It’s an “alternate clever medicine” to the sickness.

Latest news I found, they’re heading US for airing their soothing and comforting sounds [US finally!]. It may take a long time to get into the US Billboard Top Ten Chart [side by side with Puff Daddy and Britney Spears?]. Well maybe they should consider inviting Justin Timberlake on their next album to do so [hah!!! Not in this world! Can’t even imagine the art of mellowdy is being crashed and trashed].
But even so I think they’ve managed to bring new sounds to the ears of Americanas [and it’s a worth achievement! YAY!]

Well, guess it’s not overly to say that Mew is the glass handed kites, soaring the wide-sky. Vulnerable but unbreakable and in a complicated way, is unstoppable.

Keep up the great work of art and mewsic, guys!!
Always be your bestest fan!




Mew…and the Glass Handed Kites
Track list:
1. Circuitry of the Wolf 2. Chinaberry Tree 3. Why Are You Looking Grave? 4. Fox Cub 5. Apocalypso 6. Special 7. The Zookeeper’s Boy 8. A Dark Design 9. Saviours of Jazz Ballet 10. An Envoy to the Open Fields 11. Small Ambulance 12. The Seething Rain Weeps for You 13. White Lips Kissed 14. Louise Louisa

My favies: [quite difficult to choose, really] zookeeper’s boy, an envoy to the open fields and I adore the end-part of Louise Louisa it sounds a bit gospel [thou I’m not Christian] while singing the lyric-“I’m in a car, I don’t know where we are headed for. Stay with me, don’t want to be, alone.[It makes you Goosebumps, trust me].


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