Customer Reviews

You & Me

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"It's going to be a good year," so says lead singer, Hamilton Leithauser, and is in essence an exclamation from The Walkmen on "In The New Year" from their latest release. "You & Me," their stellar fourth effort is the most cohesive and impressive release they have attempted yet. This is without a doubt the best collection of songs from this band since their beginning on "Everyone Who Pretended To Like Me Is Gone." This has been the album I have been waiting for The Walkmen to produce.

Seriously, this album is a true gem. "In The New Year" is just gorgeous and my personal favorite--good, god, the organs! The album starts off gritty and grabs your full attention with the bass heavy "Donde Esta La Playa." "On The Water" is very atmospheric and the vocals just carry the listener higher to bliss until it all explodes in a very exciting ending. "Red Moon" is a soft song and is just thoroughly beautiful, particularly the use of horns. "Four Provinces" features some very hypnotic percussions. "Canadian Girl" has some excellent piercing guitar melodies.

This album is successful in many categories. I couldn't find a song I didn't enjoy nor an aspect of The Walkmen's playing that didn't captivate me. The guitars are sonic, droning and blissful. The drums pound, thump and incite my feet to stomp in pattern. The crooning is likely the best Leithauser has shown us yet--very moving. And the bass is just completely soothing. If you haven't been a fan of The Walkmen yet, be prepared to be...

I loved the grandiose, late-night epic production of the walkmen of much of their earlier work. They kept it simple at times, but at many points they erupted into all out noise-rock.
This is the Walkmen at their most bare, melancholy, and oddly laid-back sounding. It also sounds amazing! They will never match the intensity and sheer audacity of their debut work, however this may be a close second. A Hundred Miles Off was fascinating work, i absolutely loved the latin influences and the ispiration of Bob Dylan felt on that album. But for dark, late-night barroom jams for the brokenhearted, this album has them in spades. If in a bad mood, this depressing album will strangely make you feel better, as if pleasantly aware of your depressive state. This album is very hard to categorize, and very surprising. It really will make you think your life over, and reevaluate your feelings. It is an epic masterpiece, and evidence that there is no end in sight for the Walkmen.

Here it is. Seven short, long, agonizing, far-too-brief years after Hamilton Leithauser thrust his deep sadness into a Shure SM57 with the delirious energy of a rabid cougar in a tenth of the speed, we get the best-produced, most connected, most homogeneously honed offering by the Boys of St Alban's, and the content and delivery - despite being far cleaner than the quality of Everyone Who Pretended to Like Me Is Gone and far removed from advertising Saturns during Conan O'Brien - has remained fairly constant. The requisite expansion of musical palette and Leithauser's voice settling are subtle differences after this near-decade, most noticeable in A Hundred Miles Off where Leithauser struggled to crank his voice to the acmes reached in the previous album and where the rest of the band dabbled in punk-zydeco. The Walkmen's most recent offering (I say this six months later and many, many listens later) is far more sinister, tired, and skeptical of the world in which it exists. Hamilton's voice is mellower, more distant, more thoughtful, and more accurate than any other point; the vintage tube amps and one-off guitars and thick, saucy cymbals remain consistent, but even here is a lurking, dirty edge, one of functional desperation and oppressive shadow. Structurally, the songs are the most complex the band has offered up; Leithauser's voice grows more and more unsettling in moments where resolutions simply never occur after a tonic-dominant phrase or measure. There are worry lines in this album; to cover this up, the guitar work is the most technically proficient since Bows and Arrows, and the percussion (I hesitate to say trap set) has evolved from marking time or being used for special effects into an instrument, sparingly used, wisely exploited, and ferociously slaughtered when the resignation boils over.

The Walkmen are far too overlooked in the rock music world, never mind the erroneous "indie" world. I credit them with re-pioneering garage and tube-amps and dirt and fuzz and soul in rock. They technically beat The Strokes to it as well as all the derivative acts thereafter, and while they were a few years behind Jack and Meg, their aesthetic is closer to a Bob Dylan Gospel Choir than Screamin Jay Hawkins or Chuck Berry. Hamilton Leithauser's voice is some deliciously queer mix of Rod Stewart and Sinatra, with far more energy and truth behind his singing than any other artist working today. The music and primacy of craft takes Dick Dale, Richard Thompson, The Zombies, and Gang of Four and throws it all in a blender, coming out the other side a nervous, dreamy, decayed, and wistful melange -- someone driving a dirty-stringed Rickenbacker into a rare Russian tube amp cranked up and pushed through a bastardized Leslie cabinet, your ears four city blocks away from it all, the sound snaking through naked streets and abandoned storehouses and tenements and wrestling the night fog just to get to your earlobes. Of course, someone is just back and to the left, thrashing away on the drums, or claves, for pete's sakes. How many rock bands still use percussion these days, not just drums, and not in the tired Montreal sort of way? Seven years ago the lyrics were haphazard and written by prep-school naifs; now, they're as laconic as W C Williams on his deathbed, images reserved, direct, and emphatic. The words are earnest, the music a bit more dejected and far more experienced than the target audiences. Leithauser occasionally meets this salt of the earth music with a candor and deep sadness that every other act out there tries so hard to conceal through irony, makeup, beards, stage antics, corny music, or self-serving and self-referential lyrics, despite the subject matter of many of the songs positive or at least non-depressing.

Not at all a retread, though showing their roots well, a threadbare band gets vulnerable for you, just for you. Take them up on the offer. They've grown up quite a bit, you know. They're certainly no children anymore. You might even want to hold their hand a little before they slink off into the foul black brooding of the studio.

"Bile-soaked single The Rat gave The Walkmen their biggest hit,but this doubt-ravaged fourth album is their most cohesive success.Its atmospheric, indie-infused Americana is a late night treat, Hamilton Leithauser's raw vocals - he sounds like a broken, drunken Bob Dylan - setting the contemplative tone. "Seven Years Of Holidays (For Stretch)" juggles past rootlassness with a desire for security. Red Moon is about missing home and making promises; the shaky optimism of In The New Year is built upon chiming, steely guitars. The sparse songs bloom into audacious,shambling melodies, Matt Barrick's clickety-clack percussion adding a quirky charm to the melancholy, funeral brass and subtle strings which flutter throughout. Intimate, intense and beautiful, You & Me demands repeat plays and The Walkmen deserve a new respect"

I can't really put it better than Betty Clarke's five star review from The Guardian UK (above). That a fourth album can be this good is astounding in these times of diminishing returns. Hamilton's vocals have never sounded better drenched as they are by the rest of the band's splashy and reverbed guitars and skittering drums and bass. Slower and more sure footed than previous efforts this moody magnificence continually made the hairs on the back my neck stand to attention. Scarily good.

You & Me is my second favourite Walkmen album. Only Bows & Arrows is better. Definite return to form after the slightly inconsistent A Hundred Miles Off. Only songs I don't really care for at this point are New Country and Long Time Ahead Us. Instant classics are On the Water, In the New Year, Seven Years..., and I Lost You. I was at the Walkmen show Sept 10 in Toronto and they sounded great. The set leaned heavy on this release and Bows.

I can't separate one thing that I like the best about the walkmen, but the bass really stands out on You & Me. Then again so do the guitars, vocals, etc. You can hear each instrument as it adds to the overall sound, even when it's a wall of sound. The loser who used to be the administrator on the Walkmen messageboard was writing them off as of this album. He was WAY OFF! I would be extremely surprised if any Walkmen fans would not like this album, at the same time I can them picking up new fans as the songs are quite accessable without being comercially bland.

I am pleased that The Walkmen released this collection, and invited me in to share their music, interpreting it how I please. For me, this release sounds incredibly close, something that seems familiar, that's been around for a while, yet simultaneously completely new and unique. The music seems sparse but at the same time small, tight, and deep with purpose. What sounds like a lyric of despair elicits a sense of hope.

I'll keep this short and to the point. This is another great Walkmen album. If you liked previous Walkmen albums you'll like this one (although I wasn't too mad on Pussy Cats). I find it takes about four listens to get into it, then the true depth of the record reveals itself. This isn't a record you'll throw away in a month or two, this is a record that persists. Enjoy - and as with many other Walkmen records, this one really shines on a proper stereo as opposed to headphones in traffic. Captivating...

I found The Walkmen by accident. I was watching the TV show "The OC" and Seth said he liked The Walkmen. Later in that show they played some Paul Westerberg (Mr. Rabbit), so I thought The Walkmen would be worth checking out.

I saw them live in Seattle at a small club (Neomos) a few years ago and had never heard a song. I liked them instantly, especially the emotion and teamwork they bring to a live performance. They practice and practice until the delivery is flawless. Likewise, You & Me is flawless from beginning to end. "New Country" and the haunting "If Only It Were true" are my favorite tracks.

Like Radiohead's Kid A, You & Me is an album I can listen to again and again and never be the least bit sick of it.

I hope they come back again to Seattle in a small venue, because I want to see this band again.

After hearing the first song on this album I was amazed at what I had heard. A voice like that of Bob Dylan, but with a more refined sense of control, and a captivating rhythm. That song stuck with me throughout the rest of the album. The melodies of all the tracks ring fresh and clear the feel of modern music, yet still hold a vintage nostalgia. I highly recommend this album to listeners of all ages not only because of its neutrality in themes, but also for its simple beauty.

I came across the Walkmen a few years back, but never really stuck with them and slowly they got deleted from the ipod. My friend in DC recommended i check this album out, and I'm so glad I did. This is a great album, from beginning to finish.