Our Love to Admire

Interpol | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (July 10, 2007)
• Original Release Date: 2007
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Capitol Records
• ASIN: B000PY32CO
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (97 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #11,392 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Moving up to a major label has hardly lifted Interpol's spirits. This is a good thing. Even with the twisted Wild Kingdom album cover and bassist Carlos Dengler's unexpected Wild West makeover, on its third studio album the black-clad New York quartet still sounds inflexibly menacing, grasping tighter than ever to its doomy post-punk influences and delving further into frontman Paul Banks's emotional unrest. Everything sounds a little bigger and brighter, sure, but at their core songs like "Rest My Chemistry" and "Wrecking Ball" are heroically sinister, goaded on by prickly riffs and slow-bleeding rhythms. The group briefly jumps to life on the buzzing "Heinrich Manouver" and exhibits an unexpected dash of humor on "No I in Threesome," but it's the closing "Lighthouse" that best defines the set--a late-night lament that simply steals away into the dark. --Aidin Vaziri

Interpol Photos

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Product Description

Our Love To Admire is at once unmistakably Interpol and undeniably new. The witty and perverse "No I In Threesome" is an upbeat ode to shaking up a staid relationship propelled by Carlos D's peerless bass melody while the tenderly observant "Pace Is the Trick" proves that the band are still the masters of the dramatic check the painful pause right before the sinfully satisfying return of Sam's thundering drums and Daniel's ringing lead guitar. The band's impressively seductive evolution is obvious all over the record, but never more so than on tracks like "Mammoth," "Who Do You Think" and on the album's lyrical centerpiece, the ghostly "Rest My Chemistry." While Daniel is understandably proud of the song he cautions against reading too much autobiography into its lyrics. "We always leave the interpretation to the listener," he says. "I mean, you shouldn't watch a movie for the first time listening to the director's commentary!" Our Love to Admire closes with "The Lighthouse," a funereal dirge that is among the most unexpected and memorable songs ever recorded by the band. Almost entirely percussion-free, the song is constructed around Daniel's mournful guitar and Paul's sparten lyrics. Not only is it one of their finest moments to date, it provides the album's most goose-bump inducing moment, the very same reflex shivers that make Interpol live shows such an exhilarating experience. As the very last song the band recorded for the album it was, they say, the hardest to play. The hypnotic guitar part was played on a 50-year-old guitar that had toxins on the strings, providing Daniel with a blistering and painful sensation in his fingers. The band weren't even sure the track would make it out of the studio, but once they heard Paul's remarkable vocals they were floored. The song and the album doesn't so much end as it bleeds to a close with a long, echoey coda filled with feedback and strin! gs. A fittingly dramatic end to a stunning and emotional journey. Interpol is back, every bit as good as before but charged with a new spirit, a new direction, a new label and, most of all, a new confidence.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A FEW NEW DIRECTIONS, BUT STILL INTERPOL AT THEIR FINEST (4 stars), July 9, 2007

By 

Cary S. Whitt "Tune Junkie" (Columbus,Ohio USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Our Love to Admire (Audio CD)

I have the joy in announcing the new Interpol album is as good as I hoped it would be. In fact it does exactly what it needs to do. It sounds like Interpol, it's got some great lyrics, and it timidly breaks into some new directions. Our Love To Admire is another step forward for the NYC band without abandoning the familiar waters in which they sail. I'll spare the Joy Division comparisons because after 3 records, that has gotten very old, and quite frankly it's a label not all that appropriate anymore. Sure, Paul Banks' voice still has the Ian Curtis gloominess about it, but musically I think Interpol have gotten more adventurous and playful on Our Love, and in some ways, much stronger for it. Again, this doesn't mean the band stray far from the formula, Our Love To Admire is a sweeping ode to relationships and the personal struggles that come with them.

The album starts off somewhat more experimental before settling in, but after a few listens, this start, particularly Pioneer of the Falls, might be one of the key moments of the entire disc. Nearly 6 minutes in length, Pioneer of the Falls sounds as if we are witnessing a funeral of sorts, with all kinds of subtle sonic rumblings going on. It's not over the top mind you, but it's enough to evoke a new and emotional starting point for the new material. A stunning start. The first single, The Heinrich Maneuver, is an up-tempo jab to an ex-love now residing on the opposite coast, it's fun and as accessible as Interpol can be. As always, Carlos D's commanding bass lines carry the single, and in many ways, anchor the whole of the record. More familiar footing can be found in, `No I in Threesome' which is about (obviously enough) someone trying resurrect a dying love affair with ways to spice things up. In it, Paul playfully sings, "maybe it's time we give something new a try". The result, both sonically and lyrically, is a relentless and interesting view of love and how certain people may handle the harder times. Mammoth, the album's dynamic fifth track, attacks the ears with Daniel Kessler's simple, repeated guitar riffs that fans may feel echo early work like C'Mere or PDA (not a bad thing at all). More ambient numbers are also present as well. The eerie, The Lighthouse, has Bank's crooning in a way that it almost turns into spoken word, it's strange and affecting.

The subtleness of Interpol's maturation and evolution as a band is more obvious in tracks like, Who Do You Think, Pace Is the Trick, and Rest My Chemistry. All have an underlining new spirit and fervor reserved for bands making drastic changes to what they do best. Not the case here, Interpol have employed these changes with the expected precision we've come to admire from them. And even with all the expected underpinnings, the band has grown perfectly into what they do. Fully realized, Our Love To Admire is more ambitious and more rewarding than their first two releases combined, and for me, that's speaking volumes. One only has to look upon to new (and great) art direction they've added to visual represent the change in the band's direction and growth found within.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A lot to admire!, July 11, 2007

By 

Nse Ette (Lagos, Nigeria) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Our Love to Admire (Audio CD)

"Our love to admire" is my introduction to the music of Interpol. Chiming melodic guitars and a brooding melancholic feel best describes the sound of this CD.

Interpol is a New York based quartet, but you'd be forgiven for thinking they were British. Think an edgier Coldplay or Snow Patrol, or even better, Joy Division.

Opening is the gentle lilting "Pioneer to the falls" with tumbling guitar sounds. More upbeat is the humorous "No 1 in the threesome" which still manages to sound gloomy.

"Scale" is a midtempo charmer, and lead off single "Heinrich maneuver" is a dance rocker a-la Franz Ferdinand. It's a kiss off to an ex.

"Mammoth" is another upbeat number with wonderful chiming guitars. Other upbeat numbers are "All fired up", and "Who do you think".

On the slower side of things, there's the lovely "Pace is the trick", the choppy "Rest my chemistry", the atmospheric "Wrecking ball" (with a name like that, I was expecting a rocker), and the dirge-like ambient epic "Lighthouse" (with percussion kicking in towards the final minute) which to me wouldn't be out of place on a Radiohead CD.

There's a whole lot to admire on this CD.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Hoping for more, July 29, 2007

By 

C. Morrison "CMo" (Bay Area, CA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Our Love to Admire (Audio CD)

Having been a big fan of the first two albums, and seeing them a couple of times in concert, I eagerly anticipated the latest release from Interpol. However, I find my self disappointed with the new album, not so much because I feel it is a bad album, but because after listening to it 5 times, I would be hard pressed to talk of any songs that grabbed my attention. I couldn't even start to hum a few bars of anything on it, and that is just so not Interpol.

Pioneer to the Falls, The Heinrich Maneuver and Rest My Chemistry sound like they would have fit in nicely with either of their first two albums, but neither would have been stand outs. Not that they are bad songs, they just don't grab you and pull your soul into the song like a good portion of their previous work would do.

For now, Our Love to Admire will sit in the drawer. I'll probably go see them in concert when they swing by, in hopes that their stellar live show will turn my opinion of the new material. Until then I'll throw on Turn on the Bright Lights and enjoy Interpol's past brilliance.