Detail of the cover illustration of Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos #16 by Jack Kirby, 1965
Well, this one isn't quite "In Stores Now" - it comes out next Tuesday, but I was sent a copy of the CD through entirely legitimate channels, and I don't feel like waiting until next week to write about it! I've been listening to Scottish indie-rockers the Twilight Sad all week, and I saw them live on Monday. I like the direction they're going with Forget the Night Ahead, as well. Their debut album from 2007 combined arena-rock-style bombastic melodies with post-shoegaze guitar squall with a "LOUDsoftLOUD" dynamic, but the songs were a little too self-contained. The singles were great, particularly "That Summer, at Home I Became the Invisible Boy", but the album didn't necessarily hang together well. And this is where Forget the Night Ahead is a big improvement - it is an album that takes the same strengths and sounds and builds something bigger with them.
Like their debut, Forget the Night Ahead seems front-loaded at first. After the slow build intro "Reflection of the Television", you get "I Became a Prostitute", "Seven Years of Letters", and "Made to Disappear" back to back. But these songs benefit from being a little more focused, with guitarist/mastermind Andy Macfarlane approaching their sound from a different angle each time. Vocalist James Graham has a thick Scottish accent that is hard not to love, and his vocal melodies are memorable and big without sounding corny. And the album benefits from an ebb and flow with songs like the pulsing piano-based "The Room" and a capella "Floorboards Under the Bed" adding additional texture to prevent things from getting too samey-sounding.
The Twilight Sad save some of their big guns for the end of the album. My favorite song, and possibly the catchiest one on Forget the Night Ahead, is "Interrupted". It distills everything that the Twilight Sad does well into one of their most concise pop songs, which I always appreciate. A spacious sound mix, great guitar textures, big chorus melodies, a sense of real drama - what more could you ask for?
"Interrupted" by the Twilight Sad
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