Echoing around my room as I type (Echo Park - Feeder)

Member Name: Del_Boy

Product:	Echo Park - Feeder
Date:	15/07/01 (40 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great songs, Great music, Lyrically adept

Disadvantages: Not to everyones taste

Feeder, the nearly men of the Music industry. They have been going now for many years, releasing 3 albums and a mini album.

Swim was their first mini album, then they released Polythene.

A couple of songs from those albums were actually used on the Playstation game Gran Turismo 1. This is when Feeder first entered my conciousness.

Then they released Yesterday went too soon, which was in my opinion an excellent album.

This is their latest Album Echo Park, there most commercial to date, and has secured them some success in the charts,

Feeder consist of:

Grant Nicholas - Singer/Guitarist/Songwriter
Taka Hirose - Bass player
Jon Lee - Drummer

Standing on the edge
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A loud, slightly electronic tinged beginning to the new album. Good singing, lyrics that seem to infer that Grant was in some kind of emotional state he wrote the song. A good start to the album, though by far not the best song.

7/10

Buck Rogers
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Surely you've heard this song by now, if not then you have missed out on what is in my opinion one of the songs of the year to date. The lyrics whilst not the best you could hope to hear, carry the song extremely well. The music is brilliantly done, it helps the song to flow, incredibly well. The Bass playing in particular is magnificent. The drumbeat kept by Jon Lee is also guaranteed to have you playing Air Drums :-)

Definately one of my favourite songs on the album

10/10

Piece by piece
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A wonderfully mellow song with intelligent lyrics. A part of the chorus goes:

Cause nothing ever lasts forever
We're like flowers in this vase together

A nice way of saying that he wishes to keep whatever relationship he is in going. It's worth fighting for, is another part of the lyric. A lot of songs on this album seem to do with relati
onships, or personal circumstances in my opinion.

8/10

Seven Days in the sun
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2nd single off the album and the follow up to the smash hit that was Buck Rogers. Whilst not as good as the aforementioned song it is certainly worthy of a listen. At first I thought this song was too slow especially when compared to the live version. Though now I would say the speed is just about right. A cheerful song about a holiday in Southern Spain. Nice lyrical touches about his friend Laura who went on holiday with him, and her Transvestite friend called Paul(a).

8/10

We can't rewind
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This song to me is about a relationship. One where a mistake has been made, an arguement has been had. Grant has written about trying to straighten out the bends, which is his way in my opinion of wishing to put right the wrongs.

A touching song, with a brilliant beat and nice defiant chorus. One that would be brilliant to listen to live, it has an energy beneath it just waiting to burst out.

A definate anthem, alongside Buck Rogers.

9/10

Turn
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3rd Single off the album. Lyrically it seems to be about the bands constant touring. The band seem to want to say, they don't want to be the best, they just want to be acknowledged. Also again, I don't know why I think this but again it seems to have parts that refer to a relationship of sorts,

I wish that I could turn the clocks right back, it's easy to forget just what you've got.

Words that are very true, you only get one shot at this life, don't ruin it. After all you can't turn the clocks back, nor can you rewind.

An infectious chorus helps this song to become one of the best songs on the album. The guitar work has that typical Feeder edge to it, and helps to keep the song flowing. The only real problem with this is the chorus is onl
y repeated twice in a row at the end of the song, and in the fade out. I think it's good enough to have twice in the mid part of the song.

Then again, what do I know about producing, nothing that's what :-) So that would probably ruin the song altogether.

9/10

Choke
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Worst song on the album for me, and the song which I constantly seem to skip. A decent tune, decent enough lyrics and decent singing. Sadly this song is worse than the sum of it's parts for some reason. Could be good within a live setting.

6/10

Oxygen
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This albums High. About growing older, grow up with someone, it isn't all about looks. Looks fade the soul will stay young. It's easier growing older when you have a companion.

A lovely slow song, with a great message behind it. Grant shows that he really can sing in this song. Intelligent lyrics, shows that Feeder are not just a one trick band as some people try to say they are.

9/10

Tell all your friends
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I love this song. Plentiful lyrics about a relationship break up. The female in this song won't let it drop, she keeps telling all her friends about it. In the end he stops caring, he couldn't give a damn if she went and told CNN, and BBC World News. He has seen better. In a way he probably regrets treating her bad.....

Maybe everything I have wrote about in this review is wrong, as I seem to infer every song nearly is about a relationship. I apologise for that but that is the overwhelming feeling I get from listening to many of them.

Anyway, back to the song tell all your friends, this song bounces along really well, the chorus flows in and out of the song really well, the drumming, mixed with the great guitar work helps to keep it all going. One that you can definately sing along to.

9/10

Under the weather
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--

Originally titled Neurofen. This is about feeling bad, not wanting to talk to anyone you are hurting so much, for one thing or another. One of the best things about this song for me is it's clever use of sounds to make it sound a little muddled up, like he is genuinely feeling bad.

Not one of my favourite songs but within the context of the whole album it works perfectly. All the songs seem to flow into one another, which for me shows that the album has great production values.

8/10

Satellite News
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Wants to leave all of his troubles behind him for a while. He seems to want to get away from it all for a while, but he'll be back and he's going to shine brighter and better than he ever has before.

Maybe this song is something to do with him wanting to prove himself, and as such it ties in with Turn.

Lovely lyrics, great singing - one of my fave tracks on the album. The music is very suitable for this song, almost dream like at times.

10/10

Bug
---

Shouty Shouty - loud, lyrics that mean little

I hated this song at first with a vengence, but it has grown on me a lot. Not one of the best songs on the album, but a good song to close it off with. The guitars and drums in this song are pretty relentless which conveys a sense of urgency about it.

8/10

I will no doubt be back to update this opinion, and to review the songs in a bit more depth.

Do I recommend you buy this album?
***********************************

YES. The album is excellent, definately one of my albums of the year, alongside the Invisible Band by Travis. Feeder are able to write:

Darker songs - Bug, Under the weather
Fast paced songs that have you playing air guitar and air drums - ie Buck Rogers
Wistful songs - ie, we can't rewind, piece by piece

You should buy this album, if you don't li
ke it then take it back, but definately give it a try. It may surprise you.
<br>
Kev

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