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Franz Ferdinand: Tonight
Review: very funky, dancey tunes that still wouldn't horrify any indie fanatic.
If Alex Kapranos and his band had any kind of ego, they would probably be the biggest band in Britain by now. Unfortunately for such a talented outfit, they appear to not be able to make the step up from brilliant indie band to world beaters. There is, however, one thing to comfort them at night: they have made three absolutely fantastic albums, and show no sign of going off the rails.
This third Franz Ferdinand offering puts them up with the likes of Oasis and Primal Scream vying for the tag of best band in Britain.
What makes Tonight so enjoyable is that it still sounds like Franz Ferdinand, even after all the years since their last album. Yet it is also exciting and refreshing. They don’t seem pressured to sound like Franz Ferdinand now. The sweeping poppy choruses, for the main part, have gone, and we are left with very funky dancey tunes that still wouldn’t horrify any indie fanatic. The album is crisp, only one song runs over four minutes. This is of course the seven minute “Lucid Dreams”, which is a real weak point, yet is also exciting in a way as we hear the band become more techno. The use of synthesizers on this track is a bit of a shock.
There is a real David Bowie-at-his-danciest feel about this album, which is partly due to Kapranos’s husky, hushed and seductive vocals throughout. There is a significant departure in terms of lyrics here for him; he is as dirty and sexy as he possibly can be, yet in a distinctly Franz Ferdinand way. It’s a bit like watching your timid best friend attempt to chat up a beautiful woman, and actually pull it off, to everyone’s surprise.
On “No You Girls”, whose chorus is almost identical to “Oh! You Pretty Things”, the opening line is “Kiss me, lick your cigarette and then kiss me”, and it divulges into near stalker-territory from there. “Send Him Away’s” chorus sings:” I don’t care whose breath is in your hair, I don’t care whose skin is still between your sheets”. At this stage, I was nearly blushing when comparing it to the last two albums! “Twilight Omens” brings back shades of “Well That Was Easy”, and is another highly enjoyable opening half, which is completed with “Bite Hard”, which begins oddly slow, and then lurches into the most Franz Ferdinand-esque song on the album. The opening track, “Ulysses”, is quite possibly the band’s best work, a popular number on dance floors everywhere. It’s followed by another crisp number, “Turn It On”, which is possibly the coolest vocal on a Franz Ferdinand track.
Tonight sags in the second half, but that’s only because the first six songs were so good. “What She Came For” is a stuttering song, and always feels like it’s building up to something big, but it is still an album highlight. “Live Alone” sounds like a poor Freddie Mercury solo song, with less clever lyrics. Whoever Kapranos’s girlfriend is, I would worry for her, as the opening line is “I wanna live alone...” “Can’t Stop Feeling” probably brings in the most of the much-heralded African influence, yet could do with a memorable chorus, as good as the music is. The confusing “Lucid Dreams”, which sounds like the second, instrumental half, was found on an old Sessions tape and just stuck onto the end. “Dream Again” sounds like they wanted to add another track to Screamadelica, which unsurprisingly doesn’t work. The closer is the acoustic “Katherine Kiss Me”, which incorporates lyrics from some of the other tracks, and really calms you down after the dance explosion of the album.
Download: “Ulysses”, “No You Girls”, “Bite Hard”.
Rating: 8/10.
By: Ciaran Leinster
Image by Kmeron on Flickr.
