Life In A Stereo World (Polythene - Feeder)

Member Name: Modena

Product:	Polythene - Feeder
Date:	19/06/01 (162 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Price, some brilliant tracks, typical Feeder, variety of sounds, two tracks from Swim

Disadvantages: Presentation of the enhanced section, the odd weak link

Feeder – One of my favourite bands at the moment, been around for the past 5 years or so.

Members – Grant (Vocals Guitar), Taka (Bass), Jon (Drums). Grant and Jon are from Wales and Taka is from Japan.

Why do I like them? - They offer a unique blend of pop/metal/rock, they’ve released some brilliant songs such as Sweet 16, Shade, Insomnia, Yesterday Went Too Soon, and songs from the latest album Buck Rogers, Seven Days In The Sun and the forthcoming Turn. Plus I’ve seen them live at a mini gig, as well as having a signed Buck Rogers Single and have shook hands with the 3 members!

Polythene? – Polythene is the band’s first full album, before Polythene, they released a 2 track EP, the Two Colours EP (which is very rare but can be found on Ebay), and Swim, a mini album, then Polythene was released in 1997 with two tracks or so from Swim. Feeder then moved on to the brilliant Yesterday Went Too Soon album and then the current Echo Park album.

Apart from Sweet 16 (which was one of the best tracks on the original Playstation Gran Tursimo game), I had not heard any pre-Yesterday Went Too Soon work, and having Yesterday Went Too Soon and Echo Park in my CD collection, it was natural to want to add Polythene to the collection, especially after hearing a few good songs from this album off Napster and IRC.

>>About The Polythene CD
Imagine my surprise when I saw this available at Virgin megastore for £5! There are 2 versions of this CD, this was originally just a plain CD with 13 tracks, but soon after, that was deleted and made way for the “enhanced version” which features the “High” video (to find out what yours is, look at the bottom right hand corner of the cover).

The CD cover has some interesting orange/blue/green/blue artwork, with a lot of pain portrayed. The CD itself is interesting, it’s an imitation of some kind of demo reel and this features i
n the inlay, which carries the flavour of the cover and has all the lyrics of the songs.

>1 – Polythene
“Polythene Girl, wrap me up in a cellophane world”

The first track, it’s not the best introduction to an album, starts off rather passionless. But the chorus livens this song a little. This isn’t a particularly outstanding song, but I do like the combination of grunge/rock/metal.

>2 – My Perfect Day
“You wake up in the morning, everything fits, I’m still hoping tomorrow feels like this, my perfect day…”

A little more metally than the previous track, as you can tell by the intro, the beat is stronger and Grant’s voice is more screamy. Sounds of pain “I won’t make it” contrasted by the wonderful chorus (above), this is one of the better songs from this album, the metally chords played in the background make this a really complete song.

>3 – Cement
“She’s got a new dress on, I’m in cement…”

This is one of those rocky songs that sound a little lame at first listen. It’s a good tune, probably fair to label it “Brit Rock”. I’m sure a lot of people like this, but not for me…

>4 – High
“I’m going out for a while, so I can get High with my friends”

This is apparently the song that made Feeder big, and got them into the top 40. In the interview disc on the Limited Edition of Yesterday Went Too Soon, Grant says that he knew that this was going to be good once the first few chords have been written, and I must admit that the introduction of this subdued song is quite good! The into is acoustic guitar like and very surreal. This then all blends into the Feeder “Yesterday Went Too Soon” guitar choruses, one of the better songs on this album, probably one this album will be remembered for…

>5 &
#8211; Crash
“She’s my hands, she’s my hands, picks me up when I crash down”

A song about weakness or insecurity, no wonder why commentators say that Feeder have a “gay following”. The intro is rather like Yesterday Went Too Soon, but then it’s very high energy, rather like a mix of punk rock “I don’t think so” and grunge (when it slows to the chorus). A good song…

>6 – Radiation
“See the colour of my skin, it's turning blue as I breathe in, there's radiation in my head”

One of my favourite songs on the CD, I think this is a brilliant epic anthem. As the Verve would say, “the sounds that recognize the pain in me”. Very ambient for a while, then the element of metal at the right time a la Deftones: “just see how it is, just see how it REALLY IS”, brilliant tune, brilliant chorus, and the right voice. BRILLAINT!

>7 – Suffocate
“Sufficate, let them die, a better life, say goodbye, hear them cry.”

Less electric and more acoustic here, not the greatest track, very slow, a little Radioheadish; bar the electric guitar in the background. Not really the best song on the album, this song goes on for longer than it should.

>8 – Descend
“If you could see, live with my pain, the thoughts that I keep”

This song is taken form the Swim EP. A spooky guitar song, scary at the beginning. Then it screams into life suddenly “I’m not insane, can’t reach the pain”, the Sweet 16 ish chords and then into the typical Feeder chorus. This tries to be an heavy epic power anthem but struggles somewhat…

>9 – Stereo World
“It doesn’t matter if I can dream away… life in a stereo world… something happens I drift away… away…”

Another track from the Swim EP, and is one of the
better tracks on the album, no messing around here, very very heavy. This is a fast song, full of energy, and the chorus is beautiful. This also has the stop then really hard guitar as in Standing On The Edge in the Echo Park album. The song also tires beautifully at the end, a feature I like a lot. Pure energy and vibrancy!

>10 – Change
“The more I see the more it hurts, the more we change, it all seems worse”

Another slow song, I think this is beautiful. It’s very weak at the beginning, but the lyric above is beautiful. I can’t praise this song technically or it’s lyrics overall, it’s very boring and tiresome, yet it sounds good, and is relaxing in some way…

>11 – Tangerine
“I know it’s sad, life’s just a piece of fruit, touch down, new ground, stop living on the moon.”

I remember this from the Gran Turismo game, this is brilliant! This is all heavy stuff bar the lyrics, which are pop! This is a good song to listen to, probably not one to admire or analyse. One of the best songs on the album.

>12 – Forgive
“Cause we’ve got to forgive, we’ve got to forget, things are changing at last, I HOPE FOR THE BEST”

A grungy power ballad, just like a lot of the rest of the album, with verses and then guitar parts exploding on. Not the best song on the album, but rather samey if you see what I mean, but still full of energy.

>13 - 20th Century Trip

Not really a track, but an album closer, some other albums will probably have this as a “hidden track”. Nothing wrong with this acoustic ish “waking up” number, not too much right either.

>14 – High Video
Put this into your CD/DVD ROM drive, and you can see the High video, which is poorly presented and is really really compressed if you know what I mean. It’s worth having I guess, the video is no
t bad, but the presentation and the quality is awful. It’s just an average alternative band video, but rather purple and American…

>>>Verdict

I think this is a very good album, and would definitely rate it among YWTS and Echo Park, if not better! The string of high quality songs in the middle really does give this album a lot of power. If you like Feeder and can purchase this cheaply, I think this should definitely be in your collection.

It’s a shame that the CD ROM video section is such poor quality, it wipes the shine off a really good album. This is typical Feeder, harder than YWTS, and less “diaryish” than YTWS, and really shows their metal pedigree. It has the same powerpop tones as a lot of Echo Park but is far more mature in my opinion.

This could be their best album so far, please discover it if you haven’t…

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