Favourite Sons: Down Beside Your Beauty
Friday, 27 Oct 2006 17:16
Down Beside Your Beauty by Favourite Sons
Atlantic Records/Vice Recordings, out October 30th
In a nutshell…
Confessional, 1970s New York, Raw, Unsentimental
What's it all about?
The debut from Brooklyn-based four-piece Favourite Sons has created 11 tracks that take the listener down into relationships falling apart, death and loss. Heavily influenced by the New York sound of Lou Reed.
Who's it by
The story of Favourites Sons is far from clear. Singer Ken Griffin, of '90s Irish indie rockers Rollerskate Skinny, decamped to New York, found depression and penned a load of songs as a swansong before quitting music. Somehow the members of Philadelphia band Aspera - sans chanteur - linked up with Griffin and gave him the dark sound his songs deserved.
As an example…
"I can't remember things that made me feel alive when I was young. But I'm not sure if I was ever young." When You're Away From Me
"When will we go out and drown in red river? When will we go out?" The Tall Grass
Likelihood of a trip to the Grammys
With Griffin being Irish there is the chance of a Mercury nomination. But with the album drowning in Lou Reed, Velvet Underground and Ronson guitar, it probably wouldn't tickle the judges' fancy.
What the others say
"This is an absolutely fantastic and visionary collective of eleven tracks; its stockpile beauty is ineluctable." Entertainmentwise
So is it any good?
Favourite Sons set out their stall early as the first track When You're Away From Me welcomes the listener jauntily and Griffin sings "Dead bodies piling up like garbage in the sun". He goes on "I can't remember things that made me feel alive when I was young." The jauntiness doesn't last long and you are taken down to a world of being lost, hurt and almost defeated.
What saves this is Griffin's damned earnestness. Even lyrics such as "Love doesn't need me, love doesn't want me around" (Walking Here) which could sound teenage, take on a depressive honesty.
There are some tracks where the band tries to bring some dirty glam into the equation and it does not seem to add up. What works is when the growling guitars and heavy percussion push Griffin down and he tries to fight through them as if he's fighting against life.
Also against Favourite Sons is that the Lou Reed influence at times gets a little too strong. Pistols & Girls sounds too close to Velvet Underground's Venus in Furs for the listener not to pine for the original and feel let down with where the band takes it.
The real stand-out tracks on the album are the title track Down Beside Your Beauty (raw and suffocating) and the really beautiful Tear The Room Apart.
In Tear The Room Apart, again the potentially trite lyrics ("She had such a beautiful smile, I lived my life in that smile, I swear.") are saved by Griffin's honesty.
In the end of Down Beside Your Beauty aims to climb out of the depths, but Griffin seems only able to celebrate "when the world comes to an end" (The Things That We Do To Each Other). His joy seems a little forced, although he sings of lies and pain.
The joy of the Favourite Sons comes from the genuine suffering and hurt, it's just a shame a few tracks try to lift it out of the nadir and let it down.
Keep it simple and keep it miserable, the Favourite Sons are best when backing a loser.
7.5/10
Daniel Barnes
