Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Lullabies To Paralyze

As a continuation of yesterday's American music thing I turn to the album that completely took me by surprise last year - it would have been in my top ten best records of 2005 if I'd made a list like that. Queens Of The Stone Age's Lullabies To Paralyze was released in March, but I personally didn't pick it up for another five or six months. It actually ended up in my collection because it was the stupid BMG Music Club's choice of the month (note to self: gotta cancel that sucker) - it apparently was fated to be mine. After I played it a few times I was smacked silly by it's combination of heavy duty riffage, tight rhythms, creepy falsettos - like the Eagles' best stuff from the '70s - and the band's ability to write incredibly catchy melodies. I love how hard rocking this record is, but it's the singability factor that really gets me here - these songs have hooks up the yin yang. I've played this at work and several people have inquired about it - people who I don't think would normally be into a QOTSA album. I chalk that up to the fact that once you hear it a few times it snags you and won't let you go. One of the more magnificent tunes is In My Head - a super fuzzed out riff over a steady beat, guitars set on stun, creepy falsettos harmonising and a gorgeous keyboard melody that is pure new wave greatness. I read a bunch of reviews of this record that panned it - I have no idea what they were talking about! More ROCK!

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