Franz Ferdinand (2 Disc CD)

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Franz Ferdinand

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First off, I'll start out with the obligitory fair warning: You'll hear Franz compared to almost every band that has had some success in the past 2 years...everyone from The Strokes to Interpol and beyond.

Truth is, although Franz Ferdinand pays an agreeable nod to a few bands that have come before them, they have developed their own unique sound and comparisons will undoubtedly fall short. The best way to judge would be for you to see what kinds of music I really like. If you like these bands too, you'll thank me for suggesting Franz Ferdinand.

I'm kind of bummed that the album finally came out in the states...I imported a copy after hearing a download from the bands website a few months back. Here's to hoping that the band doesn't attract so much attention that their reputation preceeds their musical prowess.

I love the Smiths, first and foremost...I think they're one of the best bands that ever came together to record music. I like The Cure. I like Gang of Four, Neutral Milk Hotel and My Bloody Valentine. In recent years, I like Interpol. And I like The Rapture and even Hot Hot Heat.

The boys from FF hail from Glasgow, a town that has brought us the creative and musical genius that is Belle and Sebastian. I don't know what's in the water over there, but I'm considering importing some of it.

Franz Ferdinand come out on their debut album as a group of artists formed not for the sole purpose of creating music, but creating an atmosphere and a feeling. Fortunately for us, the guys just happen to be top-notch musicians and they've put together some of the best songs to come out in the past 6 years. Poppy? Some of it, yes...but not questionably so. Amazing bass lines, great high hat attacks and solid rhythm guitar lay down the backdrop for a painting that could only be completed by a soulfull, solid voice.

There will be the inevitible comparisons to Pulp, Interpol, Joy Division, etc. but none of them really fit the bill. This album has an overall feeling of coming from The Smiths' era, but not necessarliy a retro feel. Just as everything adds up to be more than the simple sum of its' parts, Franz Ferdinand is a unique combination of artists and musicians that seem to have come together for the perfect approach to inspired, clever lyrics and an original sound. That's right..I said it: orginal. Every band is influenced by other bands...it's how they take that inspiration and use it to their own advantage that sets bands miles apart. These guys are for real...and if you're a fan of good music that entirely eclipses what you hear on the radio in this day and age, pick it up and then email me for an address so that you can send me a Thank You card. Pick it up now before they end up on the cover of Rolling Stone as the band slated to save Rock and Roll. Then you can laugh at people who start to listen to them in July and say, 'My boys from Glasgow! I've been listening to them for like, forever!' Either way, get it now, get it later....just pick it up and decide for yourself whether art influences music or if it's the othe way around.

I'm not sure why this contrived, by-the-numbers, overhyped "alternative" CD resonated with so many people in 2004. I was even predisposed to like Franz Ferdinand because of all of the critical rave-ups of this young Scottish band. Upon repeated listenings, I found little more than a generic rock band using the marketing template of alternative rock. If this is "alternative", I'll take whatever alternative there is to "alternative".

What is so astounding about this CD is all those critics who about Franz Ferdinand, do little more than compare them to other more inspired alternative bands. Tell me what I'm supposed to like about this band, other than they sound like (pick one:)1.Blondie, 2. The Strokes, 3. Interpol, 4. Radiohead (!) or any number of other bands. Franz Ferdinand's problem is they have none of the imagination or lyrical sensibility smart pop bands the bands they've been compared to. I've heard the Shins and Franz Ferdinand ain't the Shins, folks. If you can't tell the difference then you need a new set of ears.

Franz Ferndinand's problem is a symptom of the larger problem with the entire genre of "alternative rock" ... Alternative rock is nothing more than the product marketing focus groups. Music for the psuedo-cool who think "hipness" is just another product to be purchased in the marketplace. Alternative has become ambient music for shopping at the Gap. Much of it sounds bloodless as the rest of the bland warmed-over gruel that the five major record labels serve the consumer.

One reviewer praised Franz Ferdinand as being "21st Century Duran Duran"... Since when is being like Duran Duran a good thing??? Where I grew up, Duran Duran was a posuer "haircut band" for MTV teenyboppers. To even compare Franz Ferdinand to bands like Gang of Four and Mission of Burma is so laughable it's like contrasting the music Milli Vanilli to that of Otis Redding.

If you're a fan of the current British movement toward angular pop, go straight to the source and spend your hard earned money on: "Drums and Wires" by XTC, "All the Mod Cons" by the Jam "Modern Life Is Rubbish" by Blur, or the great collection of the Buzzcocks'singles from the 1970s, "Singles Going Steady."