Letters to the Editor
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yawn...
zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.......
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sorry but
the hold steady suck. most only-loved-by-indie-critics tripe ever.
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Hold Steady!
I'm not seeing the Springsteen influence with the Killers - you can definitely hear some U2 and even some (attempted) Queen moments. The Killers seem to be name-dropping The Boss a lot in interviews - perhaps this is why the guy is mentioned in every review? The Hold Steady is a little closer, with stories tied to a particular place, and piano pieces 100% inspired by the Professor Roy Vitton. Springsteen never wrote anything as vague and unfocused as Sam's Town.
I can't speak for anyone else, but personally, The Hold Steady is exactly what I look for in music. Clever, fist pumping, hummable, and innovative in the way it makes something old sound new. I've never heard anything quite like it, which is one of the best compliment I can give to a band.
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Reborn to run
I don't anything about rock groups who scream into a microphones, but I do know something about T.I and hip hop. First, that song you quoted is from the album 'King', but it is from the song 'What You Know'. Southern rap has really taken off in the last few years and has changed the sound and feel of hip hop. 'King' is one of the top hip hop albums of the year and T.I one of the top rappers of the year, but instead you use him and his lyrics as some sort of base for tired music. Instead of examining that you take lyrics from one song and compare them to some rock group without providing any type of context. Boring, lazy journalism. Not what I expect from Salon.
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I don't think so
Killers, a major dissapointment. Can't listen to the new album without getting a headache. Murky and pointless. Hold Steady, cute and passable lyrics if you're under 15. As an aging rocker, I find a return to BTR a positive sign. But if you're looking for the real deal on stealing from Bruce check out the new Lucero disc, Rebels, Rogues & Sworn Brothers. They finally get it right and rock your face off. Best rock album of the year. No one else is even close.
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Kill your radio.
I quit listening to commercial radio years ago. While there might be some local stations here and there worth listening to while in the car, by virtue of web streaming, KEXP in Seattle is undoubtedly the best station in the country, and one of the best in the world. Other than KEXP, I listen to BBC6 via the web.
Back in the '60s the slogan was "Never trust anyone over 30." With regards to contemporary pop music it's "Who cares what anyone under 30 is listening to?"
"Mr. Brightside" isn't a bad tune. However, the Killers are, so far, a thin talent that hardly deserves mention some place like salon.com. I've never even heard of Hold Steady.
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Hold Steady
nandemosan, keep listening to KEXP. They're playing songs from the (fantastic!) new Hold Steady album on an almost daily basis. I recommend everyone try to see the Hold Steady live - they put on a great, frenetic show that might cause a giant grin to break out on your face.
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It's hard to Hold Steady when all your friends are dead already
I have to agree with robynd... seeing The Hold Steady live will erase any doubt left after listening to their great new album. I saw them at a tiny club here in Chicago back when they were touring in support of their first album, "Almost Killed Me", never having heard a single song. At first, I thought they were just a curiousity, with Craig Finn spitting his almost-spoken-word lyrics about parties and kids and disaffection over somewhat passe guitar licks- I'd never seen a band with only one microphone on the whole stage. As I listened, however, I started to recognize those kids and those parties and that disaffection, and it all clicked. By the end of the show, I was hooked. Since then, their sound has only improved and matured.
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Marah is Better
Hold Steady reminds me of the Replacements more than Springsteen, though I can see comparisons to E Street Shuffle era live shows. Springsteen was never that drunk, though. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Hold Steady is a nice throwback, but they need to expand their vision lyrically to keep me as a fan.
The Killers...I have mixed feelings. The new record does seem to be reaching for that sort of operatic ground of U2 or BTR, but in the end, it's only reaching. There's not a lot of grasp there. The imagery isn't specific enough nor the playing precise enough to match Bruce and the E Street band at their peak.
I can dig Lucero, but Marah has it on all of them. Sonic textures, odd instrumental mixes, street names, etc. are all well and good, but Marah has lyrical depth (and breadth - love songs and social commentary on the same record or even in the same song, something Bruce forgot how to do for most of the 1990s) to boot. Check out Kids in Philly, 20,000 Streets Under the Sky, or If You Didn't Laugh You'd Cry.
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It's Wild Billy...
and Hazy Davy, not Wild Davy. For the record.
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Springsteen? More like Kerouac
With all the talk of Springsteen with regard to the Hold Steady, I'm amazed that the author never mentioned Jack Kerouac, espeically since the name of their new album "Boys and Girls in America" is a reference to Kerouac's "On the Road." As Craig Finn sings/yells in the opening song's first lyrics, "There are nights when I think that Sal Paradise was right: Boys and girls in America have such a sad time together."
The Hold Steady's songs are about misfits, drug use, city-hopping, breakups, makeups, and partying, namedropping streetcorners, obscure poets, and religious figures along the way. While there is definitely a Springsteen feel to the Hold Steady, their outstanding album from 2005, "Separation Sunday," is much more "beat poet" than "blue collar Americana." On that album, Finn plays the role of a giddy Svengali leading a debauched cast of characters with lines like "You came into the ER drinking gin from a jam jar / and the nurses making jokes about the ER being like an afterbar."
I can almost picture Dean Moriarty sitting in the hospital waiting room with a wicked grin on his face.