Customer Reviews

The Coral

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I am a fan of new retro bands like The Walkmen, The Strokes, Frech Kicks, The Hives, etc, etc. But it gets old at times. When I saw this band, The Coral, on Conan O'Brien a week or so ago, I was immediately at attention. They played the song "Dreaming Of You". I just knew that I had to hear more. As soon as I did, I immediately began to wonder how I would possibly describe them to my friends. I can hear so many old Rock n'Roll influences in the music, that it's hard to pick one. The Beatles is the best way to describe it, in a different way than other bands. If you ask most rock bands nowadays the top five bands that influenced them the most, 9 out of 10 would say The Beatles, but, for The Coral, it is in a much more direct sense. I wouldn't be surprised if they started as a Beatles cover band by the way they sound, in the same way that is not surprising in the least bit that The Vines started as a Nirvana cover band. But don't think for a second that only Beatles fans will be interested. I am a mainly ska and punk (or ska-punk if you'd prefer to mix the two) guy myself. But this is still one of my favorite new bands, along with Authority Zero, Maroon 5 and Andrew W.K. See what I mean about varied musical tastes loving this band? This is the most original, incredible music I've heard in a LONG time.

After buying music from the UK scene since I was fifteen, the freshness was wearing off - until now. The last album that had this kind of impact on me was Oasis' "Morning Glory", and that album has always been a guilty pleasure. Before that, only one other release gave me goosebumps - The Stones Roses debut lp. Now, The Coral ain't the Roses, but it's better than almost any of the overhyped records from last year, including the Queens Of The Stoneage (ok, a U.S. band) and The Music, which were just "ok", at best. So, what's so special about this one - it's so over-the-top, with pop, psych, reggae and anything else they thought would fit into the stew. But, the main thing that makes it work is that it never sounds derivative, as so many other guitar acts do. There's a bit of Beefheart, Beatles, Wedding Present and lord knows what else. It's not going to be to everyone's taste, but if you give it a chance, you'll find this to be one of the most rewarding acts to come out of the UK in years.

I had never heard of The Coral but their song Dreaming of You is featured in an episode of Scrubs. It is a damn fine pop song and I had to check out the rest of the album. So...no other song on the disc sounds remotely like it. This disc seems like something put together by late 60's and early 70's acid/psychedelic bands. I hear influences by early Aerosmith, Pink Floyd, Santana, Donovan, maybe some Moody Blues and Jefferson Airplane. No one song has the same exact sound influence but it is all so groovy and funky. You would never guess by listnening that it was a modern artist or recording.

So that is a description, but does it rock? Hell yeah. I first listened to it in my car but if you have a pair of headphones, jam it on your MP3.

I am just old enough to recognize the roots of this stuff but not quite old enough to have been in my musical prime while those roots were in the forefront. I like bands like Franz Ferdinand, The Killers and the like and as another reviewer said, this is not that sound at all. I do see some minor connection to the White Stripes, but mostly due to a persistent heavy bass line throughout this album.

So to summarize:This is real retro rock. The era is 60's/70's psych rock as opposed to 80's punk & garage, but truly cool music. I am going to definitely try another disc from The Coral after completely digesting this one. And "Dreaming of You" is probably one of the better pop songs I have heard recently.

Imagine Arthur Lee and Jim Morrison sailing across the world in Captain Beefheart's ship, wreaking havoc and looting the musical riches they encounter in order to concoct the best, most bizarrely tuneful music on earth and you might be close to what the Coral's brand of psych pop sounds like.

They composed this unnaturally assured debut while no one in the band was even 20 and that surely lends their music a youthful effervescence rivalled by nobody in these days of studied posturing and mechanical songwriting- they put across the tremendous fun they must have had making this album.

I was initially drawn to this band because it was the very first time I saw anyone being actively influenced by my favourite band- Love, but I've become a Coral fan basically due to their blending formula in which the only rule seems to be that, as long as there's quality in it, every genre can be absorbed and consequently transformed in heady and highly entertaining pop music.

In addition to their adventurous nature they write truly memorable songs, of which the supremely catchy "Dreaming of You", "I Remember When" and "Goodbye" are sterling examples, without totally abandoning a more gnarly and obscure side ("Skeleton Key", the bonus track "Time Travel").

Who would have thought that the best album of the 21st century would mostly reach for inspiration from almost 40 years in the past?
The Coral's debut does just that and settles the band not as promising hopefuls but as more than qualified contenders for the title of most vital band in the world.

this is my favorite album of 2003. the songs have a timeless quality. some people call this a 'retro' fad or something. this isnt retro. this is how songs are supposed to be written and performed.

...that's probably the best way to describe The Coral's The Coral, or perhaps the vaguest way... At any rate, this is one of the better CD's I've found this year, though I write this a good 4 months or so after I bought it, and I have undoubtedly played it out since that point in time.

The CD's got boatloads of energy, some fantastic harmonies and a great sense of fun. I don't really have much music in my collection like it, though I'm not exactly in the Elite when it comes to that sorta thing. The music is creative, pretty wild and not without its clever and interesting instrumentation. I'm told the music is very Doors-esque, but I've never been a gigantic fan, so I can't really compare.

The first half of this CD is stunning and without QUESTION worth the entire price of the CD. "Dreaming of You", the song that apparently made this album's existence known, is probably the most catchy song I've heard in years, and it's easy to understand how it launched people into buying the album. "Shadows Fall" is also a beautifully conceived piece of... something. Completely hypnotic sounds here. Lyrically the band isn't really my cup of tea, though I resonate with some of the songs, "Siamond Diamond" inparticular.

Like other reviewers have commented upon, The Coral stands out primarily because it's so unlike what we've been hearing so much of in pretty much every direction this day in age. I don't know (or care?) if it borrows from a number of older musical sources, because it's so rare these days to find something this interesting and fun.

Oh, and it's a better CD to listen to in your car whilst driving then to calmly sit down with a pair of headphones on, I've noticed. It'll make even the most depressed person come alive, if only momentarily.

As many of the other reviews have said, I first The Coral on the Conan O'Brien Show. I was interested, and actually went and bought the album a few days later even without hearing anything else from the album. This album is definitely different than most music being released today, but it's clear to me where they got their sound from. Only a few of the reviews I read mentioned early Pink Floyd and/or Syd Barrett, and to me, this album sounds A LOT like the early Pink Floyd era. The short, wacked-out, psychedelic songs clearly have the Syd Barrett signature sound, especially "Skeleton Key". Almost every song has some resembelence to the early Pink Floyd days. Sometimes its a guitar riff, sometimes a certain lyric, but in either case, it's similiar. I'm not calling the Coral cheap rip-offs of Syd Barrett, nor am I saying this is a bad album, I'm simply saying that if there had been no Syd Barrett, the Coral probably wouldn't be a blessing for us today, which is simply, something different from all the other junk out there today. this is a breath of fresh air, and it's definitely a good choice.

The Coral's debut album sounds like it came through a musical time warp from the past, which, on some cosmic level probably makes them very similar to the Squirrel Nut Zippers. With reverb-y guitars and a vintage vibe on songs such as "Goodbye","Dreaming of You" or the opener, "Spanish Main," these guys could have played at the Cavern Club in the early 60s. But they are not just re-treads or throw-backs. Nearly every song is inhabited by a variety of stylistic influences, multiple tempo changes and theatrical three-part harmonies. "Simon Diamond" is one example, although it does contain the album's best turn of phrase: "now he's swapped his legs for roots, his arms and soil are in cahoots" Listen, if you can, to "Skeleton Key," and you'll hear a band unafraid to take chances, even if they sound like a klezmer band that got too deep into a bowl of rum punch. With multiple lyrical references to the sea (including their name), The Coral seem to fancy themselves as pirates, plundering various musical styles for their own salty songs. Well-versed musicians, they use any style and any instrument they can to get the job done, from accordions to banjos. The impressive part is that they do all this in less than four minutes per song. It's clever and heady stuff, though not always listenable.

This is probably what The Zombies would have progressed to if they hadn't broken up before their posthumous masterpiece "Odyssey and Oracle" was released. Rod Argent be damned! Mod and Psychedelic with a freakin' sledgehammer, it really has no business being mentioned with bands like the Strokes and the Hives or the Vines because the sounds and approaches couldn't be dfferent. I have to say, I had a bit of a time wondering wether I liked this album or not since the thing is so flat out weird. In the end, though, I completely relented to it's goofy charms. "Dreaming of You" is probably the best pop single to be released in 1968, er, this year (2003), "Goodbye" (King Crimson lick, cough, cough!) is SO much like the Zombies that it approaches plagurism (but it's so freakin' good!), and "Skeleton Key" is the strangest track, sporting the funniest and coolest outro to a song I've heard in awhile. The other songs are all very well done. Recommended, but if you're not familiar with authentic psychedelic music form the late 1960's, please go there first so you don't go on thinking this is in ANY way fresh or original.

Ah, yes, another good reason for me to continue shelling out my hard-earned bucks on music CDs! This collection is an extremely pleasing aural experience from beginning to end, and while some listeners may hear a pinch of Liverpool ancestry in the Coral's musical offerings, many of the songs are (to my ears at least) more closely akin to north country neighbors, the Inspiral Carpets (who, of course, borrowed quite heavily from Julian Cope circa "World Shut Your Mouth"). In any event, this is not a path that has been beaten, even occasionally, in recent years and although it may not be new, it is nevertheless a refreshing change of pace from the fast becoming run-of-the-mill Brit-pop sound of the 90s. Give this a spin. You won't be sorry.