It's clear that Eitzel himself could feel things weren't working as well as they should be and tried a few new approaches, including recording an album of his old songs with a traditional Greek band. It's an odd idea and it doesn't really work, but another idea was to add some electronic touches to his work and these are given prominence on 2005's Candy Ass. These electronic experiments also don't bring much to his songs sadly, and when they're the focus of the work (as on the pointless sound experiment 'Cotton Candy Tenth Power') they fall pretty flat. It's when he's back to the usual quiet acoustic form that Candy Ass reveals itself properly, and the good tunes here are some of the most understatedly great that he's written for a while ('Sleeping Beauty' is heartbreaking). But it's all too little really and when there's the dismal Looper-ish 'A Loving Tribute to My City' to get through you can't help but wonder where Eitzel can go from here if he's determined to continue making solo records, especially when it came in the wake of the triumphant reunited American Music Club album, Love Songs for Patriots.
Do I rate the first Elastica album (1995)? It's so hard to know. I think I still really enjoy it but I'm not totally certain. I do know that I don't have a problem with its shameless plundering of the UK post-punk catalogue, indeed, if you're going plundering why not plunder from a rich source. They also use all that material to fashion some spunky pop songs rather than the arty posturing of the bands they're ripping off. But maybe that's what I'm uncomfortable about, the lack of seriousness. I know it doesn't matter, but it all seems maybe too throwaway. I guess if I put that to one side though it's a decent album that races along with a lot of attitude and carelessness which still sounds pretty cool.
Now that they're sodding EVERYWHERE it seems to have become de rigueur to slag off Elbow and say that they're, yawn, borrrinnngg. I'm not having that though. It smacks too much of the classic knock down, post build-up, bullshit that we all love to engage in, and therefore is pretty meaningless. Unlike Elbow's records which are far from meaningless. Athlete they are not, despite what some people might want to claim these days. Debut album Asleep in the Back (2001) is a startlingly subtle piece of creative thinking, creating a dense, disorienting atmosphere which is thick with association and emotional stimuli. It's a clever but instinctive record which insinuates and persuades through the most delicate of musical touches. Guy Garvey's voice is typically described as "yearning" or whatever, but the simple truth seems to be that it merely reflects his own personality, his own nostalgic and sentimental outlook and his musical interpretations thereof. Musically speaking though the gentle, fluid nature of the album is astonishing and so wholly realised that it can be quite breathtaking. There are only two songs that don't quite work ('Bitten By the Tailfly' leaves me especially cold), but they serve the purpose of varying the mood of the album just enough to ensure that it sustains its utterly compelling atmosphere. It's a really remarkable album, and considering that it was finally released (after years and years of being shelved) into a music scene for which this kind of languid grace had no place, it's even more to be admired for its strength of purpose, quite apart from its extraordinary sound. The 'Newborn' CD single (2001) has a decent track in 'Lucky with Disease' but you can hear why it didn't make the cut for the album.
Second album Cast of Thousands (2004) takes a more song-based approach but still manages to maintain a clear sense of movement and smooth flow through its running time. The more woozy elements of Asleep in the Back are stripped away to leave a more skeletal musical framework but this works for most of the album to its advantage, leaving Garvey's vocals and lyrics more room to move. There are passages throughout Cast of Thousands that seem too much like ambience ('I've Got Your Number', 'Snooks (Progress Report')), but when the songs are alive, they absolutely soar - opener 'Ribcage' is one of the many Elbow songs that swells and billows and eventually overflows with keening melody and unashamed romanticism. There are subtler beauties too though and 'Not a Job', 'Buttons and Zips' and one of their finest songs, 'Switching Off', are beautifully close songs that make the most of their assumed emotional interaction with the listener. It's this ability to speak directly to the emotions that makes Elbow such an interesting band to me - so many people strive so hard and fail so miserably (Coldplay, Keane, you know, all that shite) and for Elbow it does seem all too easy to get it right.
No messing about for once, the band went straight back to the studio to record the "angry" follow-up, Leaders of the Free World (2005). This is an angry album only in an intellectual sense, because although it's inspired by a serious personal and political agenda, it is, of course, for the most part another delicate and beautifully constructed set of gentle musical dramas. It opens with one of the most rawly engaging songs in 'Station Approach' and Garvey's thematic agenda is set out pretty clearly, mixing the emotional and deeply personal with a broader view across collective experience and behaviour. It's grand, presumptuous and in some ways pretentious, but there's something so hopelessly, perfectly open about Garvey's romantic turn of mind that it all works wonderfully. The amps do get turned up a bit here and there (on the title track and superb off-kilter rock song 'Mexican Standoff') and there are some unusually spiky songs ('Picky Bugger' has a nasty little staccato string section). As an album it's moving even more towards being a set of songs rather than a whole piece in its own right, but that's where the band have ended up anyway and it's not a problem particularly (in fact, it's saved them from the accusations of a prog mentality that were burgeoning earlier in their career), and it means that the songs have to create their own momentum. Many people have a problem with Leaders of the Free World but I can't hear it myself, I think it's a fantastic album.
Then the next thing you know Elbow are HUGE. And it's all thanks to the song 'One Day Like This' from the next album, The Seldom Seen Kid (2008). 'One Day Like This' has kind of been eviscerated by its own ubiquity which is a great, great shame because it's another of those gigantic swelling Elbow songs that grows in size in relation to its emotional resonance. I guess for once everybody fell for something that does mean something to everybody rather than something that means nothing to anybody (I'm looking at you again Coldplay). Anyway, The Seldom Seen Kid is, as my friend Matt put it, "another good Elbow album". And that's fair comment, because it's not better than any that preceded it, it's just another record of their almost untouchably high quality, awash with the grace and beauty that's just become their stock in trade. Perhaps it's a bit bigger, a bit cleaner, a bit more ambitious, but not particularly, it's just more wonderfully moving and delicately astute songs which create a deep resonance without having to explain their terms. I do wonder how far they can go now, having made it big because I can't help but feel that the well is only full when you can still reach it, and although the next album is another fine piece of work, can it really carry on? Anyway, The Seldom Seen Kid is one of those incredibly rare things, a hugely successful album that is not only not steaming crap but is in fact exceptionally good in almost every way.
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