Start sinking, every time I get to thinking

Continuing my trip back through the 2010 album charts.

16/05/10 : Night Train - Keane

Our second visit with Keane and last time I moaned it wasn't the one everyone likes - and I've never even heard of this one, so I can't say my expectations are massively high.

Well, it's mercifully short, at least - eight tracks covering 31 minutes.  And, mostly, it works OK - it's generally close to their early sound but with some "interesting" bits thrown in, some of which work and some of which don't.  The rapping really didn't work for me ("and baby you are just beautiful -from crown to your cuticles") but the j-pop elements on "Ishin Denshin" worked surprisingly well, which is a phrase I really didn't see myself typing.  I don't think there's anything here to drag you into Keane if you're not aware of them, but it's an interesting amuse bouche for fans, I guess.

We're at a somewhat surprising #1 (but not all that surprising when you see that their first five albums all got to the top spot) with a new entry at the start of a seven week run.  The rest of the top five were Plan B, Lady Gaga (a new entry remix bit of nonsense), Lady Gaga and The National (another new entry) and we've got one more new entry in the top ten with Foals (#8).

Wikipedia doesn't have a lot on the album and the content is even lighter - there's nothing of interest in there.  The critics either tolerated it or hated it but it did well enough across Europe (but, unsurprisingly, not as well as it did here).

"Customers also listened to" Travis, Thirteen Senses, Athlete and Snow Patrol - nothing too far from the Keane tree there.  Whereas some of this album does venture slightly further afield (with varying degrees of success) - it's not clear whether it's exactly what the fans wanted but I don't think you can fault them for trying and it's not hateful, but also not exactly necessary.

09/05/10 - Not an instant grab
23/05/10 - Not their finest hour