In Search of Perfection

On Twitter I see a lot of tailor made content creation tweets where the original tweeter poses a question and everyone quote tweets it with their responses. One that I never could do myself was "what is the perfect album where every song is great"?

I was flummoxed. In all my time as a music listener I'd yet to encounter an album where every song is great. The closest most albums get to perfection is that every song is good except for one song which I just can't enjoy, either as a song itself or in the context of the album.

And yet so many people kept bringing up album titles with zero hesitation. Do these people seriously consider the albums they brought up to be completely free of filler or anything short of pure genius?

I'm calling bull on all of them. If I listened to those answers I'm sure I could find some shitty songs (to me) that wouldn't make them so perfect (to me). I honestly think they're just shouting out whatever their favorite album of all time is.

So I guess if I were to find perfection that might be a good place to start looking.

Scan Courtesy of COMC

For me that distinction goes to The Killers' Hot Fuss. Love that album. BUT, is it perfect to me? No. I love it as a whole off of the strength of some of my favorite tracks of all time like Somebody Told Me, Mr. Brightside, Change Your Mind, Midnight Show, All These Things That I've Done (so many good songs!). Unfortunately there are some songs that I feel lag a bit. Andy, You're A Star especially sticks out to me as a super weak link. It's basically album filler when you compare it with the first half of the album and it sure sounds like it. Andy's also kind of the point where the album starts to tail off for me. I like On Top just fine and if it were the worst song on the album it would probably have a better case of being perfect, but unfortunately it's not. I can't vibe with Believe Me Natalie either. Everything Will Be Alright is a song I've really come to like, but I need to be in a specific mood where I want to listen to "Closing Time by Supersonic, but more drunk". If you like those songs that's great and I'm glad for you. But all I can do is be thankful that Change Your Mind and Midnight Show are in the back to make sure I don't cut off the album completely at the halfway point.

So I basically don't like half of this album as much as the other half. And yet it's my favorite how?!

Honestly it's just because the songs I really like are that great. Those are songs that make me glad I got to listen to and enjoy them during my miserable existence. I've listened to Somebody Told Me over 2,000 times in my life and it never gets old. I take a break every now and then, but just when I finally hit the refresh button it sounds as exciting and amazing as it did the first time I heard it.

So if my favorite album ever can't be perfection, how else do I find it?

Well the alternative approach I took is to look at an album with the least amount of "duds" on it for me. Maybe none of them have anything as meaningful or great to me as "Somebody Told Me", but the hope is that they don't have any "Andy, You're A Star"s either.

One album came to mind.

Told you I'd blog about this band. Expect more in-depth blogposts (PLURAL!) about Cryoshell to come later though.

My mind immediately went to this album because before my old iPod nano broke, I reached a rare milestone with this album. I've played every song it 100 times. That never happens. Usually I just play the songs I really like on an album infinity times and the rest tend to just go rot. But in Cryoshell's case, I actually listened to the album in full (in theory) 100 times.

So is this that great of an album? Ehhhh, not really.
I love this band and this album, but I'll be the first to admit that it does sound a bit like they recorded two different songs and repackaged them a few times. Maybe to diminishing returns.

Let's break it down.
The truly great songs on this album (to me) are Creeping In My Soul, Bye Bye Babylon, Feed, The Room, and Come To My Heaven. Those of you who grew up with Bionicle might remember the first track Creeping In My Soul too.

The okay-good tracks on this album (to me) are Closer To The Truth and Feed. This is where I start to notice a pattern. My favorite songs were all very upbeat, or at the very least they had a more distinct rock edge. Something to give the songs some life, energy and flavor. These two tracks are Cryoshell with less of all three. Luckily some stray but distinguished guitar chords and overlapping vocals near the climax bring some much needed boosts.

Unfortunately that can't be said for the rest of the album (which is basically just Trigger, Murky and No More Words). Not even a passable guitar solo in Trigger can save it from being a droning borefest to me. The other two don't even have that.

I've mentioned before that I hate ballads (unless they're certain Barry Manilow ballads) and this band is not immune to that. How did I listen to all of these songs 100 times? I must've done something dumb like leaving my iPod on while going to bed or something.

Okay so never mind, Cryoshell's basically in the same boat as Hot Fuss. Lots of bangers I enjoy, but a few that just weigh down the whole thing. Back to phase one for me.

It was at this point that I started to have deep philosophical musings about whether perfection is possible to someone like me. I listen to most albums thinking I'll enjoy about 2-3 songs it and the rest of it will be passable, forgettable or outright trash. Could an album really do it for me? Could an album succeed where albums by my favorites like The Hives or Bob Dylan or J. Cole or Modest Mouse, or music legends like The Beatles, Michael Jackson, The Rolling Stones, and Marvin Gaye all failed?

Yeah it can. It was made by Fit For Rivals.

Unfortunately Fit For Rivals broke up in 2018 but their debut album Steady Damage is definitely one that rewards repeated listens. At least for me. This is my real answer to the "album with the least amount of duds" question (Cryoshell was there to make sure you all got some exposure to it). There are none here. Why? Well a big part of that is that this all non-stop energy. No ballads, no droning snorefests that feel like quadruple the stated time. Just pure rock from the second the album starts to the second the album ends.

But energy alone isn't enough. Luckily for me Renee Phoenix and Thomas Amason (and every other past member of FTR) can deliver some really solid tunes. There are some insanely catchy hooks on this if that's what you're into.

Also a lot of the songs are masked with a sense of bitterness. When I want angry breakup songs or songs to express being pissed off in general I expect stuff that's on this album. Lots of resentment and pure disappointment that makes you want to let out a scream. Or belt shit out with a low-toned scream I guess. Can you believe that Renee Phoenix was only 22 (or so) when she recorded this?

One problem though. I can't recall any of these songs individually since they all tend to blend together. Thus showcasing the downfall of having an entire album operating on the same frequency.

So Steady Damage really is the antithesis of Hot Fuss. Nothing on it will mean as much to me as Somebody Told Me but nothing on it will make me want to skip it automatically like Believe Me Natalie. That's pure consistency right there.

As far as I'm concerned that's as close to perfection as it can get. I'll take it until an album where every song is the greatest thing I ever heard comes out (if Daft Punk can't do it then no one can).

As always thanks for stopping by and take care :).