I can't wait for Hello Sadness. No, really. I've listened to it and all of that business, but I really can't wait for it. I can't wait for that moment where I press play and one album length later, I feel oddly relieved. I can't wait for when I start to remember words; I can't wait for that first emotional breakdown I share with it; I can't wait until I shed a tear to it or fall asleep next to it and wake up next to it void of regret...
Los Campesinos! does that to me. They are a band that specializes in pathos; they are the soundtrack to your break up and the background music to every lust fueled romance. But most importantly, they are emotive. Every single word inspires sympathy or relatively, and every single word bears that bittersweet resemblance. The problem is, I'm still trying to find that in Hello Sadness...
Even on past albums, when songs were off beat or purposely humorous ("I think we need more post coital and less post rock"), they could always be taken seriously or at face value. But that unique quality seems lost in Hello Sadness's "character." The band has described it has the most sincere album of theirs to date, but the eloquence at time fails them as less verbose and intricate choruses and verses bring the album to an idiosyncratic halt. "Songs About Your Girlfriend" is already an infantile name for a song, but singing of making "her purr like a cat" just seems so childish it can't help but capture the listener for the wrong reason. And what of "You are an angel, that's why you pray/And I am an ass, and that's why I bray"? The flow of the album is immediately broken up by these troublesome lyrics. But that isn't the only fault with Hello Sadness...
By trying to make a sincere album doused in depressive lyrics and undertones, Los Campesinos! sort of said farewell to half their sound and stumbled onto much ado. Songs vary in quality and emotive songs, though they outweigh the faltering ones, don't seem to match up against past centerpieces. "To Tundra" is a terrific highlight, but one must really dwell on the album before creating that relation to it. Hold On, Youngster was uppity, but in an effective manner and often juxtaposed the subject matter. Shorter, catchy songs paired with well positioned and composed transitory pieces made for a memorable album and Romance is Boring did much of the same, but with more depressing content. There is no "You! Me! Dancing!" on this album nor is there a "Sea is a Good Place to Look to the Future." The single "By Your Hand" is a terrific melody and tweeish singalong; "To Tundra" is that perfect emotional breakdown song. But where other albums succeeded in pairing its memorable tunes with those well placed pieces, this album feels full of B-sides. I want to call it directionless, but it seems just the opposite at times just the direction is antithetical to what I wanted and expected...
This doesn't mean Hello Sadness is a flat out bad album, it's simply comparatively not up to expectations. The album, instead, falls into this unwanted purgatory where it borders on being a stand out, but falls on the side of forgettable. Ten years from now, I can see myself playing Romance is Boring and remembering how I felt it paralleled my break up. I can play We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed and remember that first time I heard "Oh we kid ourselves there's future in the fucking/But there is no fucking future," then smirked only to have that line recur over and over. Instead, Los Campesinos! has gone with a slightly different tone and a more serious subject matter, but sometimes it felt like they should have stuck to their old sound. I commend them for making this album, I really do. In an industry that condemns breaking a norm, they wrote what they wanted to write; to be completely honest, I can't see this album losing them any devout fans. It's just in a year of memorable releases, where will it stand? Where will it stand within their own material? Regardless, Hello Sadness is an album that deserves to be experienced a couple of times. In the mean time, I'm going to wait for that connecting experience to occur so I can hopefully appreciate this album the way it deserves to be appreciated.
