The debut from British band Chapel Club - Palace - seems designed for Eyewear's aural pleasure. Ricocheting from the dream-pop sounds of early Nick Heyward/Haircut 100, to the lighter side of Echo & The Bunnymen, with a bit of shoegazing thrown in for good measure, this is a moody, new romantic jangly-guitar indie circa 1981 album that makes a nonsense of the passing of three decades. The style holds up, and while this will either sound (to come-again ears such as mine) like immaculate retro, or simply good pop for first-timers too young to care about forebears, it won't win any prizes for moving music ahead one iota. Still, it joins Hurts, and the recent White Lies albums, as keeping the 80s sounds alive and kicking.
A poem for my mother, July 15 When she was dying And I was in a different country I dreamt I was there with her Flying over the ocean very quickly, And arriving in the room like a dream And I was a dream, but the meaning was more Than a dream has – it was a moving over time And land, over water, to get love across Fast enough, to be there, before she died, To lean over the small, huddled figure, In the dark, and without bothering her Even with apologies, and be a kiss in the air, A dream of a kiss, or even less, the thought of one, And when I woke, none of this had happened, She was still far distant, and we had not spoken.
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