Tokyo Police Club - Forcefield

Suche ich in meiner iTunes Bibliothek nach "Argentina", so findet sich dort Sinéad O'Connors selten von mir gehörte Version von "Don't Cry For Me Argentina" und "A Man From Argentina" von den wundervollen Billie The Vision & The Dancers, sowie in einer Interpretation von Maia Hirasawa. Sehr oft bzw. oft gehört.

Seit dieser Woche wird dieses Trio von Tokyo Police Club ergänzt: "Argentina" eröffnet deren viertes Album "Forcefield", besteht eigentlich aus drei Teilen, dauert achteinhalb Minuten und kann hier gehört werden:

"Champ" hieß der letzte Longplayer des kanadischen Quartetts und der liegt auch bereits fast 4 Jahre zurück. "Forcefield" wurde von Doug Boehm (Dr. Dog, Girls) produziert und läuft trotz des ungewöhnlichen und sehr langen Einstiegs nur 33 Minuten, denn die übrigen 8 Titel gehen wieder deutlich in die bekannte Richtung des kurzen, prägnanten und melodiösen Indierocks, der immer wieder von elektronischen Sounds unterwandert wird. Als träfen sich Jimmy Eat World und Passion Pit zu einem Stelldichein. 

Als erste Single wurde das ein wenig an The Strokes erinnernde "Hot Tonight" ausgewählt:

Because really, everything you hear on Forcefield sounds thoughtful. But not in that overly academic, weirdly preachy way. A song called "Toy Guns" mixes easy metaphors with difficult growth: "When every other kid on the block has a shotgun / I've never known the difference between the toys and the real ones...I am just another jagged gentleman / We're both made of the same stuff." It's all poppy and, as a dear friend said, like they overdosed on 60s pop while overdosing on 2000s drugs. Tokyo Police Club have created something that doesn't feel like it was made to stand out or mix in. Forcefield, like its name implies, is personal and dependent on listeners pulling meaning out of lyrics that are so clearly meant to be vague.

Closer "Feel The Effect," while probably the album's most interesting track with static-drenched guitar solos and fist-pumping Passion Pit-esque electronics, gives us bits of a story that at first seem strange. But it also contains bits of everyday-ness like, "I've got a friend with a mohawk / He's given terrible advice to me / He is full of quick quips / Has my future on my lips / At least he's working on it / Working on it / Working for me." Whether you know someone with that hairstyle or not, you know the person who can't help but tell you what's right. It's so easy to give everyone else advice, and so hard to take it. But Forcefield plays like an album rich with self-reflection. It's incredibly insular and sure of itself, but it's also smartly innovative. Rock music in 2014 means almost nothing, and it's nice to hear a band like Tokyo Police Club going full speed into creating their own definition. And perhaps what it means to be a successful rock band in this day and age is to be less concerned about how you sound, and spend more time concentrating on what you say.
(absolutepunk)