With the 2013 holiday season becoming a distant memory, the number of new music releases hitting the shelves has increased exponentially. All too often, a once loved album is cast aside in light of the dazzling array of new choices bombarding our ears. Not so for an album that I chose as Best New Album in the fall of 2013 and again for my personal Top 20 New Electronic Albums of 2013. CHVRCHES debut album, The Bones of What You Believe, released in September 2013, remains in heavy rotation on both my radio show and my own MP3 player. Okay, so I wasn’t sold on their subsequent cover of Bauhaus’s “Bela Lugosi’s Dead” for The Vampire Academy: Blood Sisters movie soundtrack. The sepulchral mood of that gold standard of Goth anthems was lost in the pop translation. Though I don’t begrudge CHVRCHES the greater commercial success that an appearance in a tween movie is sure to bring them. Look what Twilight did for bands like Muse, for instance.
So at the risk of being redundant, I thought I would update my review of The Bones of What You Believe for those who may have missed it last fall. At the time, I may have amused only myself with the pun that I was playing CHVRCHES “religiously.” I know. English majors. But out of the deluge of new albums I hear on a weekly basis, I’m giving myself a pat on the back for having picked a keeper that ended up on many end of the year “Best of” lists besides my own. And deservedly so.
CHVRCHES has managed to combine the elements that I can’t resist in electronic music: relatable lyrics that stick in your head and make you want to sing along, uptempo but wistful tracks that fuse indie pop and dance, and a synthpop sound with slick hooks. Guitars are decidedly absent. The vocals supplied by Lauren Mayberry, who studied to be a lawyer and was an award winning journalist, don’t hurt either. I’m always a fan of distinctive female vocalists, and Lauren’s is emotive, raw and occasionally soars in tracks like one of my favorites, “Lies.” Iain Cook and Martin Doherty, the other two members of the trio, were kicking around Glasgow’s indie scene prior to working with Lauren. Cook and Doherty handle most of the instrumentation and Doherty provides some vocals. Apparently, the band name CHVRCHES has no particular religious connotation and is styled with a “V” to make Google searches easier.
There are the inevitable comparisons to Depeche Mode, which I’ve seen noted on more than one CHVRCHES review. Most likely because they opened for Depeche Mode in the summer of 2013, though it seems like every alternative band with melancholy lyrics, synthesizers and the potential for mass appeal is compared to Depeche Mode. (Other bands survived the 80’s and went on to critical success too, no?) I’m thinking Garbage myself. Being that there are charismatic Scottish chicks with distinctive voices fronting both bands. Remember Shirley Manson? Listening to The Bones of What You Believe inspired me to dig out Garbage’s own debut album, Garbage circa 1995, to hear “Stupid Girl” and “Only Happens When It Rains” again.
It seems to me that fans of The Golden Filter, Naked and Famous, M83 and Cut Copy will easily find something to love about CHVRCHES. There really isn’t a throwaway track on the disc. Check them out, and see if you don’t find yourselves singing “I can sell you lies! You can’t get enough!” with great enthusiasm after a listen or two.
