Blake Solomon
09/29/08, 01:24 PM
I’m From Barcelona – Who Killed Harry Houdini?
Record Label: Mute Records
Release Date: October 14, 2008
A sense of bewilderment comes packaged with every copy of Who Killed Harry Houdini?. When your fans are used to cutesy songs about stamps, awesome tree houses and the like, moments of emotional depth and electric guitar may startle the faithful few. There’s no real way to compare a song like “Gunhild” to anything else in I’m From Barcelona’s canon – even Let Me Introduce My Friends’ ballad “The Saddest Lullaby” complicates itself with horns and downtrodden backing vocals. Achingly slow and gorgeously beautiful, Emanuel Lundgren and French singer SoKo harmonize with the fragility of young love: “It’s only water in your eyes / It’s only words out of your mouth / It’s only me out hear tonight / And it’s only you I want to find.” A slight electronic drumbeat and campfire acoustic guitar never bounces back into bliss. The song never erupts into a friendly gang chorus. And because of this, it’s the best song Lundgren has ever composed.
There’s still plenty of playful, Swedish twee, though, but this time it comes with even more bite. “Mingus” opens with handclaps, saxophone and smiles from every direction. The lyrics sing of a man with a great family and terrible job. Lundgren laments becoming this man: “If I ever grow up / And if I give it a shot / Will I remember what we used to say?” Sublime “ba ba”’s round out the chorus and we aren’t sure what to think. Single “Paper Planes” sounds very reminiscent of Let Me Introduce My Friends. Tinkling percussion, brass instruments, clarinet, aqueous piano and a huge chorus will help make the jump to songs like “Gunhild” or slightly psychadelic “Music Killed Me” a bit less scary. The record isn’t necessarily more mature, as can be deduced from lines like, “They can take me anywhere I want / I put my records on,” but it is decidedly less cute. You won’t have to wear one of those yarmulke-esque hats with the toy propeller on top to jam Who Killed Harry Houdini?.
As is their usual fashion, IFB don’t keep you for long. 10 songs in less than 40 minutes make this album extremely digestible, even if the finale is a smidge over 7 minutes. “Rufus” brings in the electric guitar for a retro lovers' dream song. It’s a combination of IFB’s usually orchestral pop and a southern rock ballad. The song builds early into a handclap/choral section that is wonderfully introduced by the airiness of a flute. "Rufus" is long because it has to be. A portion of each song is (not quite literally) placed – and for the most part perfected - inside it. For example, earlier on we have “Houdini” and its rock-oriented sound. It nearly falls flat because this is the only song that sounds like it was created by 4 instead of 20+. The closer, however, embraces the rock and juxtaposes it next to the pop in the smartest of ways. “Rufus” has a big sound and it never feels cluttered, which is obviously the band’s greatest strength. Take a bunch of overwhelming influences and quantities, and then mash them together into something light, smart and easily lovable.
Recommended If You Like: Beulah in love, Jens Lekman, random dance moments, Architecture in Helsinki, Broken Social Scene at its most serene, twittering birds
www.myspace.com/imfrombarcelona
Record Label: Mute Records
Release Date: October 14, 2008
A sense of bewilderment comes packaged with every copy of Who Killed Harry Houdini?. When your fans are used to cutesy songs about stamps, awesome tree houses and the like, moments of emotional depth and electric guitar may startle the faithful few. There’s no real way to compare a song like “Gunhild” to anything else in I’m From Barcelona’s canon – even Let Me Introduce My Friends’ ballad “The Saddest Lullaby” complicates itself with horns and downtrodden backing vocals. Achingly slow and gorgeously beautiful, Emanuel Lundgren and French singer SoKo harmonize with the fragility of young love: “It’s only water in your eyes / It’s only words out of your mouth / It’s only me out hear tonight / And it’s only you I want to find.” A slight electronic drumbeat and campfire acoustic guitar never bounces back into bliss. The song never erupts into a friendly gang chorus. And because of this, it’s the best song Lundgren has ever composed.
There’s still plenty of playful, Swedish twee, though, but this time it comes with even more bite. “Mingus” opens with handclaps, saxophone and smiles from every direction. The lyrics sing of a man with a great family and terrible job. Lundgren laments becoming this man: “If I ever grow up / And if I give it a shot / Will I remember what we used to say?” Sublime “ba ba”’s round out the chorus and we aren’t sure what to think. Single “Paper Planes” sounds very reminiscent of Let Me Introduce My Friends. Tinkling percussion, brass instruments, clarinet, aqueous piano and a huge chorus will help make the jump to songs like “Gunhild” or slightly psychadelic “Music Killed Me” a bit less scary. The record isn’t necessarily more mature, as can be deduced from lines like, “They can take me anywhere I want / I put my records on,” but it is decidedly less cute. You won’t have to wear one of those yarmulke-esque hats with the toy propeller on top to jam Who Killed Harry Houdini?.
As is their usual fashion, IFB don’t keep you for long. 10 songs in less than 40 minutes make this album extremely digestible, even if the finale is a smidge over 7 minutes. “Rufus” brings in the electric guitar for a retro lovers' dream song. It’s a combination of IFB’s usually orchestral pop and a southern rock ballad. The song builds early into a handclap/choral section that is wonderfully introduced by the airiness of a flute. "Rufus" is long because it has to be. A portion of each song is (not quite literally) placed – and for the most part perfected - inside it. For example, earlier on we have “Houdini” and its rock-oriented sound. It nearly falls flat because this is the only song that sounds like it was created by 4 instead of 20+. The closer, however, embraces the rock and juxtaposes it next to the pop in the smartest of ways. “Rufus” has a big sound and it never feels cluttered, which is obviously the band’s greatest strength. Take a bunch of overwhelming influences and quantities, and then mash them together into something light, smart and easily lovable.
Recommended If You Like: Beulah in love, Jens Lekman, random dance moments, Architecture in Helsinki, Broken Social Scene at its most serene, twittering birds
www.myspace.com/imfrombarcelona