Girls Names
The New Life

LA RECENSIONE

Ireland, I was missing it from the list of countries that produce bands that are really in it, there was Slovakia and Mali and yet Ireland no; it was famous for giving birth to the antichrist (U2) that’s true. In Ireland, everything is green, it rains green, there are little green Celtic leprechauns pulling green pranks. The only non-green thing is the people's hair, red to contrast. Complementary. And maybe they are more Catholic than us. Even Guinness I can't quite picture.

But enough reviewing Ireland. Here, in fact, was born a small prodigy by the name of New Life (it’s the second album, I haven't listened to the first one). And there’s little new given that it sounds like '70s depressed music Joy Division & company. Other discernible influences are the Cure (Hypnotic Regression), the melancholic Pixies of Bossanova (Drawing Lines) and let’s throw in Morrisey which is never wrong.
Dark, at times quite sad, this album at least has the merit of sounding airy, with a tainted spaciousness, thus managing to reach unsuspected depths. The chasms opened by Girls Names are healing, self-pitying. One locks oneself away when alone or when too green.
One of those albums that impose an epic tone, ideal for the soundtrack of the movie you’re directing. As you look out the window at life passing by and you defragment it, slowing its course, observing the world from various points of view: the old lady walking to mass, a pug panting twice as hard for a distant little dog, a student as obnoxious as you, etc.

It’s how I like to feel when listening to this type of music, there shouldn’t be any sun though, and no one with you, otherwise the magic of music of this kind turns into a pain-inducing dirge. They are songs for moments like that, where you wish to be carried away by something rather than involved. Anyway, there are 5 good tracks, 4 less good, and then there’s Olympia that makes you gush greatly. IRA forever.