You can’t always count on certain bands to put out stellar albums. Being able to live up to the expectations of putting out a great album can be an immense challenge. When an album doesn’t live up to high standards, it can be sort of a letdown for both the listener and the artist. For their follow up album to their critically acclaimed debut Real, The Controversy do not want you to count on them…but you can count on us to let you know that their latest album Don’t Count on Me can’t be missed.
It has been almost two years since we had our interview with the band. Since then the duo of Thomas Hjorth and Laura Vall have been steadily releasing singles from Don’t Count on Me. Each single gained fast attention across the web and gave us a tease of what was to come. What a tease it was! The electronic art-pop masterpiece Don’t Count on Me takes you on a journey through a forest of emotions that some of us are too afraid to confront. With the track “Two Voices” leading the charge, the album will build you up and let you down gently.
Among the standouts on the album is the track “Luna” (Moon). The track is sung completely in Spanish. A song like this reinforces the truth that music is a universal language. You don’t need to understand the spoken language to capture the emotion in song. For those who aren’t well versed in Spanish, the song speaks of the sirens call of the night. How captivated one could be by the night with just the moon illuminating the earth’s most precious features. The song filled with bell-like tones, gentle Spanish guitar and Laura’s smooth almost lullaby tone in her voice really enhance the atmosphere of the song. You actually feel like it is nighttime when you hear it.
With such a smooth and gentle song behind you, you need a great build up to bring you back to life. This is where the track “Fly” comes in. The track is full of gritty electrical pulses that are similar to that of the YouTube videos of people playing music with giant Tesla Coils. Many of us feel the need just to throw our hands up, run away from our troubles and become free to express ourselves by any means necessary. This is the anthem for that feeling. The track has a very aggressive drum beat that adds to the “I need to run” feeling. Though hidden within that drum beat is a tapping of what sounds to be a glass bowl, a very interesting twist on the percussion.
With your heart pumping after “Fly,” you need to be brought back down to earth again. The final track “Just Say You Love Me Again” will do just that. The gentle acoustic guitar encompasses the track that reminisces of a great relationship that once was. You might be thinking the theme is sad, but the memories of good time bring a slight light on the song. In “Just Say You Love Me Again” is a lot of instrumental space that highlights the beautiful cello giving a very romantic feel to the track. As Laura sings “Please let me in your world once more, I promise that I will be yours, just say you love me again.” You can really feel the talent The Controversy has in producing ballads. That is something I would love to hear more from them in their future compositions.
It feels like we’ve been waiting a while for the drop of Don’t Count on Me. Yet, through every track you feel that every second taken to build the album was well worth it. You can count on The Controversy to put out an amazing album.
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