Liars - Liars

Liars are a force still, not just when they are digging trenches, stirring cauldrons and levelling mountains. It's always interesting when bands decide to self-title their albums. There are loads more examples, but the ones that stick out to me are Blur and Pulp (ah, well, it was retitled We Love Life, but the promo was Pulp and it should have stuck). Something about those two albums broke with traditional values of the bands - Blur for a start dumping all signs of brass. Anyway, Liars have done a similar thing by dumping the teutonic, motorik aspects and more freakish diversions for a straight-at-the-throat pop album that will obviously be one of my favourite ever pop albums just because it is a POP ALBUM created by LIARS. Like the aforementioned Einstürzende Neubauten releasing an album of 4 minute disco tunes. Andrew, I hope your apprasal of the drums sounding 'grim, tired, and quiet' is a compliment - you could add 'haunted' to that list quite appropriately. They certainly haven't lost the edge, becasue how many bands are coming up with Sailing To Byzantium's? Ah, the elctronic squizzery at the end is so sharp. The rest of the album is packed with meaningful and arresting little detours, lightning bolts of detail and a sense of playful menace. Still dark then, yes.

big big disappointment. no one will be listening to this months down the line. this is just not what liars excel at.

a couple songs are good, though

Keep talking Karl and you'll talk this album up further. How is this a disappointment? Because it's so sweetly listenable?

This album is boring. Wrong again, Stylus.

This album is a disappointment because Drum's Not Dead was something I'd never really heard before. It traced a sort of long drawn out shape filled with peaks and valleys, and it satisfied me in a way that nothing else really did. They were a singular thing that you couldn't quite find anywhere else. This album is the exact opposite of that; it is boring, even if unpredictably so. So now their whole dashing-of-expectations shtick is just that, a shtick. There's no point this time because there's no interesting progression, maybe if I thought they did something new with the whole fucked up indie-pop sound, something I'd never heard before, then I'd think it is interesting. But as it is, its just stale and boring indie; the catchy parts aren't catchy enough and the out-there parts don't make my head spin or my heart murmur. Maybe you've never heard anything like it so it sounds like a bold step to you, or maybe it just tickles you differently, who knows. Either way, I can't see myself ever finding this band interesting again. I expected something dark and beautiful and unified, but instead found something quirky, nostalgic, and backwards-looking. Not what I look for in Liars.

ok, so, good introduction, but where's the part where you actually discuss the album? oh well.

It sort of sounds like no one has any firm grasp on this album. I'm listening to it right now, and even the most clear-headed reviewers aren't really nailing it. It's kind of big and gross and unfocused. Whatever- they're a difficult band. Probably more so than your Animal Collectives or your...etc. My guess is the band members must be as befuddled as the rest of us at the end product. But it's fascinating to listen to: cavemen outsmarting themselves.

Cavemen outsmarting themselves? That would be incredibly condescending if it wasn't so stupid and just wrong. You can't accidentally record an album. Especially when it's your fourth one. They obviously knew what they were doing, its just too bad they did it.

So not the best metaphor, granted. I shall apologize to both Liars and the Geico mascots. As I say, it's strange album. PS no you're stupid.

lol

Can't really get into this one myself. Still think their second LP was their creative peak.

Thanks for expanding on your disappointment with this albaum Kafka. I appreciate your point about Liars eluding listener's expectations as becoming some kind of shtick, which is what I think too to an extent, but I don't really see it as a problem in terms of artictic integrity because I don't believe that they twisted their own arms to make this album just to spite fans of their more experimental stuff. An experimental band experimenting with pop music (a somewhat tautological expression, I admit), is probably going to happen at some point. I can't see why people have such a big problem with this. If a band like Blood Lines or pretty much anyone of Load came up with this it might be a different story. Saying "Either way, I can't see myself ever finding this band interesting again." is one of the dumbest things I ever heard - you can't possibly stand by that, it's as fallible a statement as 'Cavemen outsmarting themselves'. Why? Becauase you see them as having let you down with this album? Your argument is too full of contradictions. though - you criticise this album for being backwards looking yet loved Drum's Not Dead, but for what? It's a drum album, which is about as backward and primitive as you can get. Stale and boring indie? I really don't think so. Andrew's review is a very fair appraisal of this album to me, the melting of harshness, the guitars with a newfound direction. It's a shame The Coughs have disbanded as I'd have been interested to hear what they'd have done come their fourth album. As for your suggestion that I might never have heard anything like this, I'm left kind of speechless really.

you obviously don't really "get" it. i should never have started talking to you, i don't know what i expected. i love experimental bands making pop, that's like, my bread and butter, which is probably why i find Liars delving deeply into tepid, stale indie-rock to be incredibly boring. I have heard, much, MUCH, more interesting experimental pop. To me, Liars becoming MORE indie right now is just a huge step back--indie is nothing at this point. Indie was a name for some DIY rock aesthetic, but that shit is so obsolete because everyone can DIY and make it sound great for cheap. Now it's just a name for precious bullshit that wants to be like, 'alternative' or for those 'in the know.' saying i don't find a band interesting anymore isn't a stupid thing to say. sure, I guess they could come out of nowhere and do something I find interesting again, but I really doubt it. i'm sure a lot of people have had the experience of a new album by a band casting their entire output in a different light, and you not being able to conceive of having that experience just makes you seem, well... stupid. I think I'm done schoolin you for today, fool.

Liars can still piss listeners off. That is a good thing in a band, don't forget.....

Kafka I'm completely with you here so I just had to help you out. Liars were my favorite band with the release of Drum's Not Dead. I still consider it to be one of the best, if not the best, record of the new millenium. It was unique and captivating in so many ways, and on seeing the material performed live, I knew that it was something special. I saw them at the pitchfork festival last year, and it was brain-shattering. (Read the tinymixtapes review of this album to get a similar perspective) Which makes this record all the more difficult to bear. Im not going say I was their best fan, I did not give we were wrong much of a chance, and it took me a long time to realize how good Drums Not Dead was. Still I cant help but think ppl are jumping on the bandwagon without truly getting what that album was about, and now, what this album is about. This album is an attempt at the fame the band thinks they deserve (and which I think they deserve as well), but the end product is too forced, for the first time the left turn they've taken is not a natural one, not one that is true to the spirit of liars. Yes they're are good songs, but Drum's Not Dead was not about the individual songs, it was the piece as a whole, just as their live show is about the whole. It just seems so hashed off...but Im not ready to quit on this band. The true fans, will wait for the next album knowing the potential they have. They may get the attention they want, and what Im hoping will happen is the joke will be on all their fans of this album who on their following release have their minds blown and once again renounce the band. I read in an interview Angus said that they can do much weirder, that nobody quite knows how wierd they can get yet. I'll be waiting for that when they think people are ready for it.

i liked the energy and sound fields of their last album very much, this one is the disappointment Mr. Kafka describes so well.

Check back on all of you schmucks after their next album drops and you all love it more than anything else you've ever heard...how come no critic caught the Yeats reference in "Sailing to Byzantium" in any of the six or seven reviews I've read? Is it perhaps because critics are much less literate than they pretend to be? I mean, no one has really ever heard of WB Yeats, right? Another obscure Irishman, doubtless....

oh like your so smart mr ive heard of dostoevsky

I've heard of punctuation and capitalization too.

Daleyz, why would you want a joke to be played on all of the bandwagon jumpers of this current album? You yourself didn't get the band at first, then you did and had your "brain shattered" at the Pitchfork music festival with thousands of your close friends and "true fans." These sentiments are a dead end road. In general, the ability of a band to totally piss off even their most ardent fans once in a while is at least interesting, as long as the band seems invested in the material. Karlkafka, your points are valid but all of this finger-pointing and bandied "stupids" are a bit much. Meatbreak got your shit, he just didn't agree with it and explained it perfectly well. Obviously you want to be pissed, so you will remain so. Sure would be stupid to stop listening to "On the Beach" or "Tonight's the Night" after hearing "This Note's For You," though.

I wasn't pissed, just spouting what I thought to be true. There are a lot of pricks that comment here, so I don't mind mentioning it. Such as raskolnikov. he's a prick.

Dear Karl Kafka--I am a prick. And I'd rather be a prick than a pussy like you anyday.

I don't care that they've tried to make a pop album and I don't care that they delight in confounding fans. To me Liars were bigger than the blog hype and annoying hipster posturing, but this album seems to be aimed at gaining widespread acceptance, both within the internet music bubble and outside of it in the real world. This is a noble goal- just that I wished the material was a little better to show for it. And personally, I just hope they'll turn more experimental and not, as Kafka believes, become a band that has lost all potential to create music singularly unique.

raskolnikov: nice one, i believe yeats was about as unirish an irishman as you could get, above nationalism for much of his life and well-educated as a "west-brit". but we'll fucking claim him and his genius, yes please! 'the second coming' is one of my favorite poems.

Oh, and Grandpabanks, I forgot to mention: meatbreak certainly did not get my point, because if he did he would not have asked why people (meaning me, I assume, as most of his comment was directed towards me) have a problem with experimental bands playing pop music(I think I made it really obvious I have no such problem.) Meatbreak's only real response to my criticism of Liars taking a step backwards by delving into 90's-era indie was to point to the Gaerig's review and call it a "fair appraisal." So he really had nothing to say at all. And another thing, none of you really got my whole "I don't find this band interesting anymore," point, taking it to mean I'm absolutely positive this band could never put out a good album or something, but that's not what I meant. All I meant is that the stale-indieness of this release really breaks their whole aesthetic that they were developing, and so I don't find their progression as a band that interesting anymore, sure Drum's Not Dead is still a good album, as is They Were Wrong..., but neither of them have the same mystic anymore, primarily because they don't hold the promise of something new and exciting for the future(plus, once most bands turn bad, they stay that way.) Why do I think this album does not bode well for their future? Its because this album suggests to me that Liars aren't self-aware enough to know what they really suck at, or they just don't give a shit and wanna be more popular. OH, and even worse (and possibly more telling) they're touring with the great one-album-wonder... Interpol. Fame is coming their way at least...

meatbreak! the coughs are done?!! aw man that sucks. i saw them at a ywca and they were the loudest band i'd ever heard (until sightings came on right after). they were amazing, man that's a shame.

Look Karl, you repeatedly get on here and lob inane insults at people and then decry all of the pricks who comment? I wasn't criticising your comments, just your reactions to people's responses towards them. If you want to perpetuate a fight, please address the snarling dog in the corner who called you a pussy and leave the rest of us alone. You made your point about 5 times, believe me I and everyone else here got it. You at one point rip someone for imagining that the band wasn't sure what the outcome of this record would be (mocking the idea that they don't know exactly what they are doing) and then rip the band for possibly not being self-aware enough to know what they suck at. Or just wanting to become popular. Pretty narrow reads. I don't care, your opinion is fine, it is just that. Again, I thought you voiced yourself perfectly well the first time. Just please spare us the "schooling" and half-baked theories on "indie" and your general air of self-righteousness. Interpol is a steaming pile of shit, yet you were duped by their first record and have insinuated yourself as a one-time Strokes fan who then mocked anyone who still rates them. Quite a track record you are building up. Should I now ignore all of your comments in the future knowing these things? We'll see. I assume Grandpa was an insult. Weak.

Perhaps it would have been simpler to say: Karl, your "mystic" is ruined for me.

There's only one thing left to do with Kafka: put him on Trial and hope he achieves some sort of Metamorphosis, otherwise he will be held in a Castle in Amerika to await sentencing to the Penal Colony.

Listen, "Grandbanks" (wasn't a joke, that's just how i always read your name) I don't know what your problem is, its not like I'm even being particularly abrasive, insults were even thrown at me first! I explained myself because the dude obviously misunderstood me. You can go back and read it however you want. I was just straightening shit out. And I only throw insults at specific people for saying specific things, I didn't just toss them off randomly. You act like insults have been the bulk of my comments, but thats not true, they're just a little side note that usually wasn't even said in a particularly mean way. You probably just don't like my opinions because you are boring and you have nothing interesting to say, so you just play the moralist good guy that looks out for common decency. It seems like the only prick in here without reading comprehension problems is raskolnikov. So, boring guy that seems to be on every thread on stylus: fuck off. Oh, and looking through my comment history to see if I said anything "uncool" = incredibly fuckin lame.

Poor Kafka. So alienated, so misunderstood--so bereft of ability to explain himself properly. Grandbanks put a target on your back and repeatedly hit it. He does that. You do not.

I wasn't going to comment here again because I was done after the petty insults, but if we're dragging this out for 20 comments more I'll come back to it to say that I did get what you were saying Kafka, I got exactly what you were saying and I said I found it very hard to understand how you can write off a band and assume to know that they will never make anything that interests you again just because they've cut loose and knocked out something lighter. Bands aren't making music for the listener you know, they do it for themselves - or at least should know that. People (no, not just you) may be disappointed with the lack of depth of this new album, but it's really not a sign that they have run out of ideas. Given their previous albums, all I can assume is just what I said - they've cut loose for a bit and let a little light in, having a bit of fun. I also really don't see this album as being stale and tepid indie - That would be the SnowPlays and Kaiser Parks of this world - I'm not sure what kind of music you're referencing when you say 'Indie' because at the moment it's such a nebulous term, so I wanted you to expand, you know - create a dialogue - but all I got was juvenile insults. I don't think throwing a curveball like this album is breaking with their aesthetic at all because theirs is all about breaking expectations which doesn't necessarily mean a record of mind-expanding drum circle droning every time beacause retreading is not what forward thinkers do. I know you said it's a shtick to be the band that defies expectations, but that's what you want them to be for you, but only in the way that you want. I think that Liars creating an album like this is even more interesting than if they had tried some even more cosmic experiment that completely failed. From my listening of it, I don't think this album fails as the thing the band wanted it to be. Drop the self-righteousnes tone and we'll all get along much better.

P.S. diemythtruth: Yup, Coughs RIP as of about a year ago I think. Real shame indeed.

Well, I'm glad everyone understood me, then; I only felt the need to clarify because people kept making comments misconstruing what I said. I think the indie-ness of this release sounds forced or just jammed in there, unlike their first album where the indie-ness was more of a dance-punk style thing that seemed to fit more with their general sound. I'm just turned off by Liars doing sentimental 90s-sounding indie, whether thats exactly what they were going for or not. Also, it seems like you guys just happened to read my comments as if I were foaming at the mouth or something, but looking back over them it doesn't seem like I ever really got that out of hand or offensive, I didn't even mean to seem completely serious. Does it not occur to you that I might be able to hurl inane insults in a perfectly calm and rational way? Such as... Raskolnikov: you seem even more pathetic with your nose up Grandbanks' ass than you did jumping at every chance for a literary reference. You're definitely cooler than those silly critics who pretend to be all literary! You go dude!

You win, Kafka...your "mystic" appears to be far more than I can handle.

Karl, I remember your comments because you have directly called me stupid before, not due to a response I made to you, but to a response to someone else. I am not concerned with coolness, just confused opinions. I read people's comments occasionally in order to give them the benefit of the doubt, not to snipe them. Take that as you will, I have no problem being a nice guy, a moralist, called boring, or told to fuck off. You see, I get to live my perfectly exciting life filled with exciting friends who play in exciting bands and make great records. It's fun. I comment because I am a sucker, that I have admitted repeatedly. You see, I can acknowledge some of my faults. My comments weren't harsh either, dude, but whatever. My problem is your problem. At some point maybe you will get it. This isn't an attack, just the truth. Most people on here don't like it, thus the endless circular comments.

you really take this shit to heart, dude

oh, and yes, thanks for catching my typo raskolnikov, you're great at that, maybe someday you'll get to edit someone else's writing!

I'd call confusing "mystic" and "mystique" far more than a typo. Do you have trouble distinguishing plastic from plastique also? When you're calling everyone else idiots on this site, while simultaneously slagging a smart and serious band, perhaps you should make sure you are using words that are actually contextually related to what you are trying to say.

Jokes, Karl, jokes. Mystic was funny. I make no apologies for meaning what I say, and expecting others to, as I value my time.

Oh, and at this point we all need to fuck off, me first.

you guys are such a joke. when i make fun of you guys its actually spot on, and then you act like somehow i didn't get YOUR lame jokes?! ridiculous, you guys are just a bunch of self-serious wannabe intellectuals who think that somehow you're playing some game with me and i don't get it, when in reality you're playing the exact same fuckin game as me, and you're worse at it! raskolnikov, i can't believe how far out of your way you go to sound smart, you say so much about so little. but yeah, we do need to just let this thread die, this is a little ridiculous. let it be known, though, that through all this bullshit i was the one that actually had the most to say about this album(i was NOT just slagging liars,) i wasn't trolling or anything. you guys truly are jackasses, and i'll say it with a smile on my face, knowing i'm just saying exactly what i mean :-D

Kafka--see previous comment.