This is great and (somewhat unfortunately, for obvious reasons) a very strong indicator they would have delivered on following up the Meadowlands and then some if they could have held it together (and if Charles could let go of perfection). Queens, holy shit!
The P4K review hinted that Charles’ version of “Queens” is better than the one that made the Aeon Station record. (And I like “Queens” a lot) so maybe?
I think it's as good as the wrens in a 'you could pull half of an awesome wrens album from these songs' type way. I want to hear the wrens version of queens very badly
I've never listened to The Wrens but I liked the singles I heard. Is The Meadowlands the place to start?
thought this was fucking great honestly, didn’t feel like a significant step down to me at all from the Wrens stuff personally. that said, I had only heard Meadowlands once a few years ago prior to this month when I gave it a re-listen and finally checked out Seacaucus. both were great records too, and I would prob put Meadowlands in the top slot if pressed but I also don’t have years and years of built up emotional attachment to it like so many seem to and I think it helped me go into this record with maybe less expectations. idk. despite not being a diehard there were some heartbreaking lyrical moments on this record and there’s a very strong emotional undercurrent throughout that’s a very “happysad”, bittersweet kinda thing. some of the songs have such an organic driving quality to them, like they just crescendo and build but they’re subtle about it. I neglected to check out the singles (and I am glad I did bc it works so well as a whole), and tbh I don’t know what I expected from this but I know I expected less than what we got even if just due to the nature of how this album came to be.
As much as I love The Meadowlands - I always find myself returning to Secaucus more (and prefer it overall) Feels much less one-paced than The Meadowlands - There's a surprise around every corner