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Club Europe: Pure Dance Chart Material, Vol. 2
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The fourth album from precious indie-pop quintet Trembling Blue Stars, Alive to Every Smile is another painful, frank confessional on the perils of love. Although formed by Robert Wratten, one-time frontman for indie-schmindie troubadours the Field Mice, there's no hint of the juvenile jangle of his previous band. Instead, these 10 tracks of ornate indie pop pile on hand-wringing misery with a rare, melodramatic intensity. The opening tune, "Under Lock and Key," glowers from under a crumpled sheet of feedback, with Wratten dispensing end-of-tether relationship advice in a fraught tremor: "You've got to stop f**king her up, you've got to grow up / You've got to stop making her cry / She thinks you want to, and you know she's right," as sharp-edged guitar lines circle like vultures. If this record does find comfort anywhere, it's in the bright lights and deserted parks of London. The nostalgic "St Paul's Cathedral at Night" harks back to relationships past: "Talking in an empty cinema / Walking back through Parliament Square / St James Park at Christmastime / Glimpsing the lake through the evening lights." Inevitably, these misty-eyed recollections crash back down to Wratten's lonely, lovelorn reality. But, to paraphrase the gorgeous "Ghost of an Unfinished Kiss," it was never going to end with dry eyes. --Louis Pattison