Band Wars--Round 1--Real Estate vs. Chromatics

Real Estate's Days versus Chromatics Kill for Love.

Started with the Real Estate album of summery, melodic, lo-fi janglepop with mellow, sometimes whispery, vocals.  If you've ever heard "Laughing" from REM's first album, then you'll have Real Estate's blueprint--minus the distinctive vocals of Michael Stipe.  Their sound evokes yearning for nearly lost memories.  It is an album for lazy afternoons, road trips, and daydreaming.  The overall effect is sadness.  On the downside, there is not a lot of variety from track to track.  The bonus, I guess, is that you'll always be able to spot a Real Estate track (unless you make the mistake of thinking it is early REM).  Nothing really grabbed me as a standout track, yet the album remains consistently strong.  The first three tracks were probably the best.

Here's "It's Real" (track 3):

The first thing I noticed about Kill for Love is that it clocks in at just over 90 minutes, more than double the length of Days.  In the past, they just would've made it into a double album, no?  This is a dark, brooding, synth-pop album which begins, oddly enough, with a cover of Neil Young's "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)."  I'm a big fan of Neil Young and liked the risk.  The rest of the album is filled with quality brooding tunes.

The adjectives that allmusic.com attaches to Chromatics are bleak, detached, dreamy, druggy, eerie, hypnotic, intense, ominious, sexy, stylish, tense/anxious, and trippy.  Nailed it.

Here's "The Page."

The cool thing about this album is that, after a strong start, they mix in some ambient tracks that strengthen the mood.

Well, Real Estate's album is good, but it can't compete with Kill for Love.  Even though I prefer some of the Real Estate songs to these, this Chromatics album seems like a favorite to win the competition.

Well, there we are.  I fully expect an asskicking for Julia Holter in the quarterfinals, but who knows.  Maybe I'll change my mind after a second listen.