It's a bit ironic that I bought this album on vinyl. Around the time this happened, I was doing DJ'ing quite regularly, but I didn't really do it with vinyls, mostly because most people where I played records didn't have turntables. This album would've been perfect for playing in kinds of indie discos where I played, but I could only play CDs in those places. Then again, in many of those indie discos, the songs played had to be really well known and I'm not sure if that would've been the case with this album.
The album starts with furious drumming and funky bass lines in the song Jager Yoga. In the intro it doesn't really differ that much from normal guitar indie that was popular in the mid-00s, but things change when the synths and doubled vocals with non-melodic yells come in. I like the way the song keeps growing. Rat is Dead (Rage) is another guitar-heavy indie rock song. There are excellent slightly psychedelic riffs after each chorus. Let's Reggae All Night has a solid funk bass line and in a way that reminds me of the debut album the most. The sounds of this song are much more synth heavy than most of the album. Give Up brings back the guitars. The intro sounds almost like it could start an Interpol song. That image is soon shattered by the vocals with minimal melody. Left Behind is the obvious hit song of this album. It's a fresh sounding mix of electronic sounds and guitars. They mention Helsinki in the lyrics, which was very important back when I was living there. Beautiful Song has slightly softer sounds even though the tempo stays up with upbeat melodies and pumping bass. How I Became Paranoid brings back sharp guitar sounds, disco drums and synth riffs. This song sounds like it would work brilliantly live. Move is probably my least favourite song on the album. It's a bit too dance-heavy for my taste. It kind of reminds me of the Australian synthpop band Cut/Copy. I Fly has a darker guitar-heavy approach even with some solo-like riffs. I like the hectic tempo that would be excellent for jogging. Believe Achieve is a slower tempo synth song with funky beats. The album ends with one of my favourite songs on the album, Air Painter. it's one of my favourites, because it has a great melody and drama between different parts of the song.
Left Behind has a strange music video. It has people dancing wearing disco outfits and strange masks. The moves are intentionally quite humouristic. This is a great song for humouristic dancing so it's all good. It's a really low budget video, since it's pretty much just people dancing in masks in front of a white screen. Towards the end we see the lead singer singing without a mask with all the masked dancers.
Back in uni I didn't really care for this kind of music that much. Melodic singing was really important to me and I found it difficult to enjoy this kind of singing. Then again, looking back, this really wasn't that bad. That's probably why I bought the album in the first place. The bigger reason against this music at the time was that my back then girl friend really hated this kind of music. I wouldn't have been allowed to play this stuff at home when she was around.
I must admit that I haven't listened to CSS in a long time, but now that I got back to this album, it sounds better than it ever did before. I like the funky rhythms on the album and the vocals don't really bother me at all anymore. I actually think it's excellent that I own such a good album that's a bit different from the albums I usually have.
Listen to the album on Spotify.
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