Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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42 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An atmospheric masterpiece ..., May 17, 2004
Broken Social Scene are incredible. With one solid masterpiece under their belt ("You Forgot It In People"), an excellent B-sides/rarities collection ("Bee Hives"), and a Best Alternative Album Award from the Junos, BSS seem nearly unstoppable. People SHOULD be excited for this band: "You Forgot ..." is quite possibly THE quintessential post-millenial indie rock album (a modern-day "Slanted & Enchanted", anyone?). Who can't forget the raging guitars that opened "KC Accidental", the superb groove of "Pacific Theme", or the genuinely sincere "I Wanna Be Your (...)"? These are all minor masterpieces in their own accord. "Bee Hives" will tide poeple over until their next album, but for real crate diggers, there's the album that got everything started: "Feel Good Lost"The biggest err one can make is expecting this album to be anything like "Forgot". If anything, it's quite the opposite - no barn-storming guitars, no extreme pace changes, and hell, no vocals! This album has the pure and simple goal of hitting atmosphere - and it does its job incredibly well. This is an emotional album, pure and simple. Each piece evokes a feeling or mood inside of you - sometimes you just have to wait until the right moment. This album is the soundtrack to your own self-made Volkswagon commercial - driving a road at night with the sunroof down; these are the songs that are in the background. Take the fuzzed-out atmosphere guitar of "Passport Radio" as a good guiding light for the eve. The drums decide to want to dance around a little bit on "Alive in 85", but something like the near-tribal "Stomach Song" comes into play, and your mindset is changed yet again. The band finds melodies in simple-yet-beautiful guitar lines, like a downtempo Explosions in the Sky. Throughout the album, a particular string sample does occasionally find its way into the songs, as if to act as a unifying theme - it never fully materializes, but provides a glimmer of familiarity in the sometimes vast-instrumental landscape that lies before you. Every listener will identify with a particular section of the album or a particular song, which leads to my personal highlight of the album, the mere 3:06-long "Guilty Cubicles" - a lullaby of a guitar line that creates a feeling of desired love and nights where getting home is only a secondary priority. It's a beautiful highlight to an already-beautiful album. By all means, this isn't something you absorb in one listen. It will take awhile for the "Forgot It"-fan to get used to this slower and dreamier incarnation of the band, but for those who can lay expectations aside and accept the album for what it is - you have a new soundtrack for you life. Enjoy.
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12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Lose yourself in this CD, November 28, 2004
Well to be honest you can't lose yourself in all parts of the CD, and more's the pity. This CD is on the brink of masterpiece that You Forgot It In People achieved, but there are some tracks that ruin the beautiful and ethereal atmosphere the first half establishes and only resumes near the end. My ratings:
1. I Slept With Bonhomme At The CBC: 9/10, mmm what a way to start it, beautiful, mesmorizing, enchanting, etc. etc.
2. Guilty Cubicles: 9/10, it continues, this track blends flawlessly with the previous and continues the beauty.
3. Love And Mathematics: 11/10! Yes it goes off my own scale, my favorite jam song ever, it's like a drum fiesta with guitars swooping and diving around the core drum beats! Best track on the album by far!
4. Passport Radio: 8.5/10, dreamy vocals, dreamy guitars, it's all-around... what's the word... dreamy!
5. Alive In 85: 9/10, very catchy, makes me want to bounce, quite a nice poppy feel to it you can't help but like.
6. Prison Province: 5/10, yuck! I mean... why? They were on a role, they were kicking ass, but this song is the first of the "bad half" of the CD.
7. Blues For Uncle Gibb: 6.5/10, very dark, and not very pleasant. I somewhat enjoy the haunting hermonica, but the rest? No.
8. Stomach Song: 6/10, this song sounds like it emerged from the stomach, so in a way it's fitting. It's grating and annoying.
9. Massbroker: 7.5/10, cheer up, things are getting a little better! While the violin squeeks like a dying animal at the beginning, it gets better toward the end.
10. Feel Good Lost: 7/10, I love the name, but as title tracks go this is just too weird and too short.
11. Last Place: 9.5/10, yes, back in action! This 8-minute-long track is amazing, your ultimate roadtrip song, it makes me think of rolling plains of grass.
12. Cranley's Gonna Make It: 9.5/10, triumphant finish, one of the catchiest songs on the album, and I love how it ends so breathlessly, just like you feel after this album's rollercoaster of sounds concludes.
If it weren't for the dark and dreary middle of this CD (which some could argue is necessary, as it completes the voyage this CD takes you on), I would rate the album a 5. As it is, I treasure the truly great songs off this album as some of the best instrumental rock songs ever made, and I am so happy Broken Social Scene is only continuing to get better with time.
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26 of 30 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Feelgood not lost anymore, March 29, 2004
"Feelgood Lost" was the first Broken Social Scene album, but their second "You Forgot It In People" was what really broke this eclectic, smooth band into the limelight. It's less polished and more raw, but the ambience and richness are definitely there. It starts with the slow, shimmery "I Slept With Bonhomme At The CBC," before shifting into the steady, unexceptional "Guilty Cubicles." A more rock-edged sound appears (the slow-burning "Love and Mathematics"), along with eerie songs (the experimental-sounding "Passport Radio" and too-quiet "Blues for Uncle Gibb") and melodious pop (the stately "Alive in 85," bouncy "Cranley's Gonna Make It"). The sound of "Feelgood Lost" is a lot less polished and complex than their second album. But don't be deceived -- this is no demo or B-side album. It's just a group that hadn't fully come into bloom yet. There's rock, there's pop, there's even the murmuring, sweeping experimental soud of "Passport Radio," which sounds like the soundtrack to a surrealist computer-animated movie. Violins, keyboard and synthesizers meld together seamlessly from the very start, with faintly strumming guitars and steady percussion underneath it. There's even a bit of fuzz guitar at the end of "Love and Mathetmatics." The funny thing about Broken Social Scene is how the music all seems to meld together into one big shimmering whole, especially in the slower, softer numbers. Sweet, silvery atmospheric pop is the staple of Broken Social Scene, and their first album lives up magnificently to that. It's a bit rougher, but the spirit of it is still there. "Feelgood Lost" isn't lost anymore...
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