Send "Snow Patrol " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Pitchfork |
 The world of UK guitar music has changed in the decade since Snow Patrol signed their first major-label contract. A passing glance at the state of British mainstream radio neatly illustrates how it's shifted for bands of their ilk: When Snow Patrol inked a deal with Polydor's Fiction imprint in 2002, Steve Lamacq still lorded over evenings on Radio 1. His "Evening Session" show was where I first taped songs by bands like Idlewild, Snow Patrol, and Seafood.Tune in tonight between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m., and you're more likely to catch Guetta or Skrillex than an "indie" pop band. It's pretty much the same during the day, when hyperactive bass music and loud, super-compressed pop music hold court. You might think bands like Coldplay, Snow Patrol, and Elbow would be beyond trying to square up to that world, but Coldplay ushered in some subtle shades of R&B production on last year's Mylo Xyloto, and on Fallen Empires Snow Patrol pick at similar threads with electronic touches of their own. That change in direction is evident on opener "I'll Never Let Go" as arpeggiated synth notes open and then carry the entire song. The build from there is slow-- growing as distorted guitars throw weight into the chorus-- but the song reaches ridiculous proportions when folk-pop singer Lissie provides gospel singing toward the finale (warning: she pops up on an additional three songs). You get the sense they're shooting for something epic, something that would sound just as big as the pop bangers on radio, but the results are goofy. Electronics appear heavily on another four songs, enough for the band to describe the album as a showcase for their "secret love of Techno." Listening to those songs, it seems less the product of five guys who secretly listen to Michael Mayer backstage before playing to 10,000 people, and more like somebody who might enjoy the techno preset demo on a Yamaha keyboard. They sound more at ease in the second half of the record, returning to the territory of big ballads and acoustic guitars. That portion of the album's ushered in by "Berlin", a charming instrumental that sounds more like Sufjan Stevens or Jónsi (Owen Pallett and Nico Muhly provided arrangements here and elsewhere). Less edgy, sure, but signifiers like that are a much better fit for a band that has always had a knack for big arrangements....full text |
| Independent |
| You wouldn't imagine one man could feel so much: like its two immediate predecessors Eyes Open and A Hundred Million Suns, this latest Snow Patrol album comes freighted with the weight of Gary Lightbody's emotional turmoil. As he observes late on in the album, "I've crashed to earth, but I've fallen for so long that it was just relief" – and certainly, at times here one suspects he simply enjoys a damn good wallow in self-pity. But at least you can tell when one's coming on, by the epic melancholy of the piano chords that recur like a symphonic motif in "The President", in the song of aching separation "New York", and most effectively in the new single "This Isn't Everything You Are", where the uplifting title hook, a cross between Coldplay and Elbow, provides the album's most affecting moment. The gentle thrum of strings and stiff-upper-lip nobility of a lone horn offers fulsome, but doubtless sincere, support in surmounting bereavement, offering further confirmation that consolation is the dominant trope in modern stadium rock, rather than the exultation or hedonism that marked earlier examples of the form. However, Lightbody's by no means as wallowy here as he once was. Fallen Empires is the band's most varied and adventurous album yet, and he applies himself accordingly elsewhere. "I'll Never Let Go" opens proceedings with an urgent throb akin to Joy Division's "Transmission", then shifts gears, using gospelly backing vocals to acquire an anthemic veneer reminiscent of "Gimme Shelter" – both unlikely touchstones for this band. And in "Lifening", Lightbody lists what he wants from life – from "Ireland in the World Cup, either North or South", to "Just some simple kindness, no vengeance from the gods" – over a backdrop of guitar arpeggios, strings and woodwind. Most shockingly of all, there's even a singalong road song of quite charming aspect, "The Symphony", which finds him barreling along in almost euphoric mood: "You can see the road ahead in your dreams/ The engine's more a sigh than a scream/ Your ghosts look more like angels from there," etc. Even if it's just a dream metaphor, the auguries are all positive this time around....full text |
| Guardian |
| Their sixth album sees Gary Lightbody's anthemic rockers take a leftfield shift apparently inspired by LCD Soundsystem's The Sound of Silver, U2's Achtung Baby and Arcade Fire's The Suburbs – unit-shifters all, so it's experimentation within the context of arena rock. Nevertheless, in come uncharacteristic four-to-the-floor beats (Called Out in the Dark), Sisters of Mercy-style, choir-laden epic goth (The Weight of Love) and simple, sublime pop (The Symphony). After suffering writer's block, Lightbody has found plenty of brooding darkness for the title track, Those Distant Bells, and This Isn't Everything You Are, a doomed love song with a tragic twist. More happily, Lifening simply lists simple pleasures ("Ireland in the World Cup, either north or south"). Although the variation in styles doesn't make for the most cohesive album, the default mood is still downbeat but anthemic – songs for couples to cling tightly to one another while raising mobiles in the air....full text |
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