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By Tom Victor, Saturday 13th May 2006 12.00pm (2885 views)
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Even though this is Snow Patrol’s fourth album, the band appears to suffer from ‘second-album syndrome’.
This is understandable given the widespread and, some might say, unexpected success of previous offering ‘Final Straw’. Although they remain able to churn out tracks of the calibre of breakthrough hit ‘Run’, the band surround the likes of ‘Chasing Cars’ on this album with weak album tracks which fail to catch the eye. This album in its entirety is reminiscent of The Cooper Temple Clause’s second album ‘Kick up the Fire and Let the Flames Break Loose’, both through its inconsistency and the adoption of a slight change in overall style which fails to convince.
Stand out tracks on the album include Chasing Cars, a complex and brooding track, Set the Fire to the Third Bar, a haunting duet with Martha Wainwright, and fittingly climactic ‘The Finish Line’. All three of these could well feature throughout Snow Patrol’s North American tour during May and June.
However they are all the sort of songs with which a band would finish a live performance. The problem arises in the more upbeat tracks on the album. Of these, the strongest is probably ‘Headlights on Dark Roads’, but the energy of this upbeat sing-along involuntarily serves to highlight how subdued - even boring - some of the preceding material is.
Current single ‘All That I Have’ and other songs of a similar tempo among the unnecessarily long 57-minute album sadly lack the spark of past hits ‘Spitting Games’, seeming almost devoid of any innovation, especially in their lyrics, as they fail to leave their mark. Furthermore, the three bonus tracks seem unnecessary, and show why they didn’t make the original cut.
This is frustrating, considering the potential shown in the standout tracks. The duet in particular seems capable of appealing to as wide an audience as the multi-platinum selling Final Straw. Martha Wainwright’s voice shows signs at first of becoming intrusive, however the subtle vocals of Snow Patrol frontman Gary Lightbody complement it brilliantly. It is at times like this - when Lightbody returns to the vocal style exhibited in ‘supergroup’ The Reindeer Section’ - that all of the band’s elements combine to be at their most effective.
Overall, Eyes Open clearly has its strong moments but fails to build on them to produce an album to echo Snow Patrol’s undoubted talent. Nevertheless, Snow Patrol have probably taken a step in the right direction and it is not difficult to see them pushing on from this to produce a memorable fifth album in the near future.
For more information you can visit: http://www.snowpatrol.net
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