Farrah & New Album

Farrah, a brilliant UK powerpop quartet, have finished and released a new album. It’s their fourth, a self-titled album, and so far it has only been released in Japan. A release for western citizens will follow later this year. I’ve been following the band’s activity but obviously haven’t been able to keep myself completely up-to-date as the Japanese release came out in July…

This band has a nice back catalog. Especially their first album is superb but I will mention some things about the second and third album as well. Go ahead and comment if you have more experience on the subject.

Moustache (2001)
Farrah’s debut album is a great collection of songs, to me a true classic. The album came out as god knows how many different versions, different song lists and even different album covers and colors. Anyway, the songs are magnificent, the sounds are great, the sounds (I love those percussions) are absolutely cheerful. And then there is of course Jez Ashurst’s voice… To cut a long story short, to me his voice is highly addictive as it is one of those incredibly boyish, sweet, bubblegummy powerpop voices. He is not my #1 favourite but he is definitely one of the best.

The album isn’t addictive just because of Jez, however - the songs are addictive. I will always remember Tired of Apologizing, a song that deals with relationship hardships of with such delightful peacefulness that it actually turns negative things into good. Terry is another song about a certain type of hardships. The song is really nice, catchy, sympathetic, and well... sort of psychedelic. There is also a Rubinoos cover of I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend, as well as a lovely ballad in Superman theme, Lois Lane. Living for the Weekend and Seventies Superstar are very charming, those songs I also tend to listen to when it's summer and the sun is shining, and even if it's not shining. Seriously, everything on this album is awesome! Some people might think there is a filler or two here but I wouldn’t do that. I like all the songs equally much. Great sounds, great songs, cool arrangements - indeed, a classic.

Me Too (2003)
The band’s sophomore effort is not quite as coherent as the first one was but it’s still very good. It begins with a fabulous song couple, Tongue Tied (check out the video) and Daytime TV. These songs reveal more about Jez’s geeky vocalist persona. I never get tired of the wonderfully silly drum sound of Daytime TV… A drum sound must be good if it brings a smile to the listener's face every time the song starts. This album also contains a cover song, this time it’s Joe Jackson’s It’s Different for Girls – sweet, really sweet. As a whole, Me Too is another collection of charming, slightly melancholic powerpop songs. Wake up is one of my favourites, as well as The Last Word.

Cut Out And Keep (2007)
This is also a nice album. It remains as the most distant of Farrah's albums to me, but the reason is simply that I still haven’t found the time to listen to everything on it properly. On the album there are of course again some really sweet tracks. It is impossible not to enjoy the Weezer-ish Dumb Dumb Ditty (can be heard on MySpace), and No Reason Why that has a cool horn arrangement (also on MySpace). A fancy music video was made for Fear of Flying. Check it out if you like, the song is as sweet as power pop can get - typical of Farrah.

Farrah takes care of the PR. The band likes to keep a video diary and they are even on Twitter. When it comes to their new material, it obviously sounds good. However, I’m not entirely convinced yet, so I’ll wait to hear the new album in its entirety. A part of me certainly thinks this band will probably never reach the greatness of Moustache again… Well, I shouldn’t ever say never. We’ll see.

Farrah on MySpace
Farrah on Twitter
Farrah – Official website

From the new album: Can’t Kick the Habit
From Cut Out And Keep: Fear of Flying
From Me Too: Tongue Tied
From Moustache: Terry

Sing Like It’s a Prayer

I’m really not that much into faith or Christianity. Nevertheless, I was very curious about checking out what critically acclaimed Christian power pop sounded like. I listened to The Elms’ debut album The Big Surprise (2001) and, like basically everything I listen to these days, it was a success.

The Elms have come up with some very traditional pop-rock here. There is energy and a suitable dose of power pop angst in this material. Very fine string arrangements also highlight some of the songs, like the wonderful Here’s My Hand and the dramatic title track The Big Surprise. Songwriter Owen Thomas sings lead, and I really like his voice. It’s suitable for both pop punk-ish songs like Hey, Hey and pretty slow songs like You Get Me Every Time. At times Owen Thomas really sounds like Jon Rubin! (Guess who is one of my favourite singers…)

The lyrics contain general musings on life. I’m quite happy that there aren’t many songs about God-related things on this album but there are a few, though. To be honest, I’m not really that much of a lyrics person. I really don’t tend to listen to lyrics. So it actually doesn’t matter what the lyrics are about... Or even if they're good or not. Despite this, I always at some point try to concentrate on the lyrics so that I know what the music is generally about. Sometimes the subject is very easy to hear right away, especially if the singer's pronunciation is clear.

The Big Surprise (and the band’s next album, too) was released by a gospel label EMI/Sparrow. Since then, The Elms have changed their label and don’t focus on spiritual subjects anymore. They seem to be quite popular these days and they are about to release their fourth album soon. I should check out their more recent material some day.

The Elms at MySpace