Review: The Rapture- In The Grace of Your Love

“You need to un-quit your band”, said DFA frontman James Murphy to Luke Jenner, singer of the then disbanded group, The Rapture. With the breakout success of their scathingly raw album, Echoes, and then the rave pop stylings of Pieces of the People We love, The Rapture had seemed to cement their status as a group on the bleeding edge of pop, dance and punk. To the surprise and dismay of many Jenner seemed to want no part of this, opting instead for seclusion and parting ways with The Rapture. With the surprising death of his mother, the birth of his son, and finding his role in the band grow increasingly distant from what he wanted, Jenner decided to call it quits. As celebrated was their accession, so to was their painful demise mourned. Times, thankfully, have changed; Jenner is back, The Rapture is back. In The Grace of Your Love is the result. And it's damn impressive.

With In The Grace of Your Love, Jenner returns to his former band with drastically altered ambitions and intentions, and the band's tool set is equally repurposed. Indeed it may be more apt to describe The Rapture under it's current incarnation as using an entirely different set of styles and techniques. This was my initial reaction to the album, however in the end In The Grace of Your Love is really still just pop music, an entity not entirely disparate from Pieces of the People We Love. The key differences that divides the two albums by such a wide margin is purpose. With In The Grace of Your Love, Jenner channels a insatiable passion for true and genuine sentiment. This is a far cry from, by comparison, a collection of party pop superfluousness in the previous album; one that was comprised mostly of songs about partying, dancing, copulating. Don't get me wrong, I love Pieces of the People We Love, but In The Grace of Your Love radiates an emotional functionality and depth that reveals the slight shallowness of their earlier work. In retrospect I can understand Jenner's prior frustrations that led him to part ways with the band; If all you can communicate is a desire for hedonism, then stagnation will surely kick in, festering and strangling the creative process. Better to move on before that happens. Thankfully in this case, Jenner returned with a renewed sense of purpose eager to explore his capacity for more emotive offerings.

Top 5 Albums of 2011 to Still Look Forward To

We're about half way through 2011, and so far there's been some pretty good stuff! PJ Harvey, Radiohead, Destroyer,  Cults, Fleet Foxes, Cut Copy, Tune Yards, and plenty of other acts have made our last year before the apocalypse well worth our while. But what have we to look forward to heading into summer and fall? Well quite a bit actually! Read on if you dare! Or something.

5. Bjork- Biophillia- release date TBA

Over the past few years and couple releases, Bjork has ejected much of the slightly tragic innocence and cultural naivety from her persona. She's transitioned into something of a more matriarchal, even monarchical role. Between tracks like “Oceania” and “Declare Independence” she has become downright domineering. While this new role has grown increasingly divisive among fans- Volta was not as universally well received as past offerings- I really like it! Bjork's been by no means absent from the industry, as she's been involved in multiple collaborative efforts, but it it's been too long since a full LP. The announcement of Biophillia- cryptically dubbed as some sort of multi media project, now appears to be just what we need to fill the gap. Biophillia goes far beyond just another collection of songs, as every track will also be released with a corresponding ipad app. The functionality and connectivity of the songs and the apps so far has yet to be fully disclosed, all though one appears to be some sort of space invaders style mini game, with the catch being if you win, the song ends prematurely. Judging by the slightly bewildering but undeniably cool new website Bjork's put up, where you can hear some of her insight on the process, Biophillia will be nothing if not interesting. Remember back when people thought it was weird when she made an album without instruments?

Check out the first track “Crystalline”

Song of the Week: "Sail Away" by The Rapture

One of my most anticipated albums of 2011 has got to be The Rapture's upcoming 3rd LP, The Grace of Your Love. It's been an agonizing 5 years since their last effort, the brilliant but criminally underrated Pieces of the People We Love. As the release date slowly draws near information about the album is starting to trickle out including track lists and producers- Phillipe Zdar, namely. The biggest bombshell however is that the Rapture are back on the DFA; so I'm pretty excited. To get others excited here's a clip of The Rapture performing a track from the new album called "Sail Away". It's not officially released yet as they only occasionally play it at shows so far, so the video quality could be better. But that doesn't stop it from being a damn good song. Hurry up September 6!