The XX

I know, I'm falling for it rapidly

I've listened to Infinity twice now, and those woozy boy-girl vocals are just really doing it for me. I don't mind his voice so much when they sing together.

It's not the second coming or anything, but it's a lovely, atmospheric haze of beauty.

<3 this album it's amazing!

I don't get this yet.

Finally listened to the album all the way through - hard work tbh, as it is pretty boring.
First off the guy's voice is the WORST, and even the girl with the huge underbite, who has a pleasnat voice, lost my interest eventually. The music, which still sounds nothing like Young Marble Giants, is too colourless and unengaging on too many tracks.
I did like "Crystalised", "Night Time" and "Basic Space", but not enough to make me want to go back to this band again. Heigh ho.

i quite like this and can see why some would love it. probably helps that i'm listening on my senns so hearing the good bass (and aforementioned space) well.

Was fucking certain I'd revived this this morning, or yesterday, to say that it sounded better on big ass speakers than modest headphones.

that seems like a given to me!

True, true, it didn't need saying. I just thought I had said it.

Finally tracked down this album today and have given it a spin or two. The aesthetic is fairly uniform, but for all that, it’s an interesting one. I didn't quite understand the ostensible Aaliyah influence until I tried to explain what I liked about the album, and came up with this: "The push towards total minimalism musically does the same thing for me as Aaliyah and Cassie’s vocal minimalism. The further and further it approaches total stillness, the more and more entranced I am, pulled into this black hole of charisma and repetition. Trance-inducing almost." So, I guess there's some truth in that claim, at least to my ears.

I'm not sure how it'll hold up to repeated listens, but there's certainly something interesting going on here.

i sort of like what this band is going for, but i'm not feeling the execution.

i really like this when it's playing but i seem to forget it after it's over.

going to keep trying.

Tom E just pointed out to me that they've covered Womack & Womack.

Aspects of some of the stuff I've heard reminds me of early Shriekback -- All the Greek Boys, Brink of Collapse, etc.

I keep being reminded of the first Cure album....

that Teardrops cover is great

Whoa they covered Teardrops? *scours the interwebs*

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrVgCCUQ3fQ

Oh man, for a whole 30 seconds I thought it was going to be the Massive Attack song and got really REALLY excited. But alas, no.

sadly it was just the totally awesome womack and womack song

W&W's Teadrops >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Massive Attack's Teadrop (and I do love Massive Attack)

And I think Massive Attack would agree

W&W's Teadrops >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Massive Attack's Teadrop (and I do love Massive Attack)

― Andy K, Thursday, August 27, 2009 6:03 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

Thanks for YT clip Andy!

xx is the first studio album by English indie rock The xx. Produced by the group themselves, it was originally released by Young Turks Records on August 17, 2009 in the United Kingdom and is scheduled to be released on October 20th in North America.

YEAH, it will be out soon here in America. That cover is great.

just read that they scrapped sessions with Diplo (?!). good on them.

cover of 'do you mind' the uk funky classikk - http://www.thefader.com/2009/08/26/the-xx-do-you-mind-kyla-cover-mp3/

these guys are pretty rad

Got this on a chum's recommendation and a couple of cursory listens have revealed the lad's singing voice as a *big* stumbling block for me - his affected drawl is the kind of thing that gets put on by every other male teenage contestant on the X-Factor etc and it pretty much scuppers the whole endeavour. That and the dreadful lyrics.

If you're going to have the vocals so front-and-centre on a record then they'd better be special and in this case it's just not working for me.

rly tho what is it with bands like this covering songs like that instead of actually trying to make music more like that in the first place (not that these are bad examples of that necessarily, unlike say FAT M doing 'You Got The Love')

Maybe they don't want to make music more like that in the first place? Maybe they think they'd be rubbish at it? Maybe there are elements in the song that they wanted to bring out in a different way? There are loads of reasons!

Actually the The XX making funky would almost certainly be terrible - unlike this cover which I think is great.

of course of course, still quite a frustrating trend at times and sometimes hard to see the value in re-context of these songs beyond cred-chasing xp

Maybe they think they'd be rubbish at it?

is this not u+k?

"actually trying to make music more like that in the first place" leads us to Bloc Party's "One More Chance" and that horrible strangulated vocal which dude can get away with in indie but not in piano house.

tho who knows, maybe Temper Trap will cover 'In The Morning' and i'll love it

"actually trying to make music more like that in the first place" leads us to Bloc Party's "One More Chance" and that horrible strangulated vocal which dude can get away with in indie but not in piano house.

Or alternatively, The XX debuting with a mediocre dubstep track that disappears without trace upon release.

and that horrible strangulated vocal which dude can get away with in indie but not in piano house

they could've made it as an instrumental! interesting statement tho re shit horses ok for some courses

Joker remix of XX surely in progress as we type

Or alternatively, what is the point in castigating an indie band for not making a dance record when there are already so many potentially great dance records in the world that no one has a hope of hearing them all anyway?

because sometimes hard to see the value in re-context of these songs beyond cred-chasing

i'm not saying XX covers aren't good just that it's part of a trend which seems to usually not work

total headphone album

^^ yes.

Quite impressed that they self-produced, since the production so ideally fits the material.

listening to this now and while i don't have a fully formed opinion the thing i keep coming back to is THEY ARE 20 and understand a lot more about why music works than most lifelong musicians do.

And good on them for that. (Reminds me of Disco Inferno in a way...)

i'm not saying XX covers aren't good just that it's part of a trend which seems to usually not work

it's true that it's an annoying trend which usually does work - what's amazing is that in this case it works superlatively. they've covered 3 originals which i love every single note of, and done them in such a way that it seems totally natural that they should be played like that. that's an incredible thing to have done.

Just read the P4K review, and this:

The xx didn't need a gestation period, though xx is nuanced, quiet, and surprising enough that you might.

manages to capture exactly what I've been trying to express about this record when trying to sell my friends on it, but about twelve times more eloquently.

only heard the tubes posted here, but i'm sorta ~almost~ really liking these guys. like its some uncanny valley thing, where it sounds enough ~like~ music i should like, but falls short in some minor and inconspicuous way

young marblemouth giants

I just wish they'd left all that ropey single-note straight eighth note guitar off the album. Dah dah dah dah dah dah dah dah DAH DAH DAH DAH DAH DAH DAH DAH dee dee dee dee dee dee dee dee. Young people need to be dissuaded from learning from the Bernard Sumner Guitar Method Series (bless, tho).

try listening with better audio than youtube tbh

did so.