Why don't we have a thread on Bat for Lashes?

whew, thx. i suspected.

basically, you can tell exactly what kind of music she wants to make, and it's the sort of music which is GREAT when done well, but she has no personality or spirit in her voice and her songs are meandering, aimless, poorly things. and she thinks she's a lot crazier than she is.

dang lex you don't hold back

i like "daniel" it just seems unfinished to me, like it's really missing a MOMENT + i have to imagine that it's just a misguided attempt at being "understated" and "ethereal"

really i may never be able to get over seeing her live, way before any hype, at a night in an art gallery that a friend had curated, and i was like "aw, i should approve of her out of loyalty to my 15-yr-old self, who would have considered a trip-hop tori amos the very pinnacle of pop music, but really she's a bit shit". and then she paused and asked the audience to "howl like wolves" along to her song, at which point i think i just fled in horror to the room with the booze in it.

Two Suns now on Spotify:
http://open.spotify.com/album/7cj1dERc5yhFBqtxlRYGSe

I'm liking it. Not loving it... yet.

bahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahhahaha

xp

plus points, i guess, for coming from a famous pakistani squash dynasty though

lol squash

liking this so far

for a second I was like "I thought squash were only native to the americas"

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/05/arts/music/05play.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=Bat%20for%20Lashes&st=cse

She tells the NY Times about what she's listening to: Telepathe;D M Stith; Cat Power; Cut Copy; Antony

record is turning out to be better than I expected after several random radio spins.

not getting much love, i see. i really quite like the new album. i don't think it's likely to reveal much more on future spins, but i kind of like how her voice seems to reconcile and bring together all the different sounds we hear from the instruments. not a massive step up from the album before, but it's got something going on.

Exactly. Also, "The Big Sleep" is all kinds of awesome.

Both the problem and the brilliant thing with artists like this is that the bar is set very very high. When it's done well it's genius, otherwise it can sound pretentious and a bit embarassing and Bat For Lashes falls well short of genius.

^OTM

the drums on this record are fantastic. who is it?

She certainly isn't getting much love from her record company here in the States, been to four stores this week and no one seems to be carrying it. I'll probably buy it online this weekend.

Well, I agree that she's not yet at the level of Kate Bush or Tori Amos or Bjork, but if you hold all new music to the standard of the best existing music with which it has any common elements, then you'll never like much. I thought the first Bat for Lashes record had some great moments, and I think this one lives up to its ambition more consistently. Ignore anybody who seems emtionally invested in belittling you for liking this (or anything). Their issue, not yours or hers.

I heard "Daniel" first, so maybe something else will displace it in time, but for the moment it's still my favorite song here. Like some great alternate-history drum-machine demo for Rumours...

this lady is some coffee shop shit

xpost

Well, I agree that she's not yet at the level of Kate Bush or Tori Amos or Bjork, but if you hold all new music to the standard of the best existing music with which it has any common elements, then you'll never like much.

I'm not holding it up to a standard, I'm just saying that this sort of thing is very very difficult to do well and those who do tend to be pretty spectacularly talented.

this lady is some coffee shop shit

kind of a tense atmosphere for your herbal tea drinking time, isn't it?

btw, two suns is way much better than fur and gold

the drums on this record are fantastic. who is it?

― cutty, Friday, April 10, 2009 12:25 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

Chippendale, I'm told.

ha, srsly? most melodic playing i've ever heard from him.

Credits say percussion by Alex Thomas for most songs. Drum programming by Natasha and David Kosten.

no, i've confirmed through internet he plays drums on "glass" and that's the song which i was referring to

she can basically be dismissed with the words "you, sir, are no kate bush"

After four or five listens I can safely say that I like Two Suns more than at least 62% of Ms. Bush's studio albums. This record is aces.

this mention of Chippendale is intriguing me...

had assumed this was some OMM bollocks

I assumed this was some lame indie shit that I wouldn't like, I should probably stop doing that

'cuz I'm loving this right now

well the song "Daniel," haven't heard the album yet.

Well, I agree that she's not yet at the level of Kate Bush or Tori Amos or Bjork, but if you hold all new music to the standard of the best existing music with which it has any common elements, then you'll never like much.

I agree.

"Daniel" is really great, haven't heard the full album yet. But am curious.

Heard a couple other songs and I think she's alright. Strange no one seems to have mentioned the Siouxsie influence, it's pretty clearly there.

I'm just saying that this sort of thing is very very difficult to do well and those who do tend to be pretty spectacularly talented.

There are many spectacularly talented songstresses that don't pull it off. Usually the issue isn't talent, but an excess of "tasteful" influences that consign the whole into the category of "don't need to hear this" or "music for my mother"...

ilxor is right: what pulls BfL back from that abyss is that she has spent her youth immersed in the kind of music I myself did. And Siouxsie is definitely one of them. I heard it first in the chorused bass on the first album, but that soundworld of early-80's production is all over the two.

general prettiness throughout this but nothing else to say about it really. I suppose her voice is too unremarkable compared to the supposedly similar artists mentioned above, and that's a flaw depending on your outlook.

'Two Planets' stands out for me but why that plus 'Moon And Moon' if calling the album Two Suns?

Goes with 'two-hearted dream', Natasha and alter-ego (see back cover), etc.

The best parts on this are where she strikes out and sounds different, the drums on Glass are what hooked me almost immediately. I expected a starbucks till album and it was a smack across the face for being too jaded. There's at least four or five tracks here where she totally confounds expectations and they're just really great little moments. Considering that I really disliked her last album hearing something like Siren Song completely floored me.

Yes, Siren Song is the pefect example. I didn't care too much for her last album as well, but I simply can't stop listening to the new one. There's so many great tunes, brought with such sincerity, such honesty. It really is a surprise for me to like this so much.

streaming this today and really feeling it for some reason. some of the comments upthread about how high the bar is for this type of music totally make sense but right now i'm not even that down on it when she's missing the mark.

I think the Tori Amos-esque "ballads" on the album (see: track 3) don't work nearly as well as the more upbeat, inventive material that is reminiscent of Kate Bush, Siouxsie, Bjork, etc. Overall it's a damn good listen, I just find myself tempted to hit SKIP on the slower material sometimes.

i listened to 5 songs and the obvi bjork rip two planets was def the worst for me. it's weird because i'm only occasionally into kate bush or bjork and have no use for tori (never really listened to siouxsie). so like am i just feeling this album today or is it something i'll actually listen to a good amount?

some of the songs are slower, but i think the sequencing makes up for that a little bit.

the songs might be a bit more molasses than you'd like, but i'm finding there are elements to them that keep things fresh. her vocals can be particularly unpredictable... like "peace of mind" blew me away the first time i heard it. "siren song" starts off slow, but the piano picks it up to almost a whirlwind pace.

also, the bass-line on "pearl's dream" is awesome.

just thought i'd throw that last bit in there.

i don't really get the "sounds too much like kate, bjork" business. i can hear it, sure, but since when were ilxors incapable of divorcing something they're listening to from it's influences? it reads more like lazy criticism.

the fact that you have to juxtapose kate bush and bjork to even come close at describing khan's music sounds more like a compliment than anything else to me. bjork alone has an expansive sound that you really can't pin down. so then how can you say that khan is too derivative when bjork doesn't have a definitive sound?

The only track that sounds Bjork-like to me is "Two Planets," and I think it's partly in the percussive elements and partly in her voice, which takes on a strangely Bjork-ish tone here and there. It doesn't sound like the Sugarcubes or "It's Oh So Quiet" or anything from Medulla, but I could see it as an album track from, say, Homogenic.

"Glass" kicks ass

She/ they were GREAT on Letterman tonight.

made me forget I was watching Letterman on a Fri night right before my bday.

But I digress. Dsniel obv, and just amazing sound. Additional hot chicks (Natasha is BANGIN) playing guitar and huge kettle drum kit. Guy playing the awesome synth parts but annoyingly dressed like Win Butler in a D&G fashion ad.