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Rating:
To replicate the success of "Final Straw" would have been a daunting task for anyone, and Snow Patrol have surpassed it. "Eyes Open" is indeed a beautiful album, blessed with immense global success (in both acclaim and sales) (even in the U.S., where "Chasing Cars" soared).
The strengths of Gary Lightbody and company (great sense of melody and a solid, smooth pop-rock writing) are not only confirmed but enriched by a quality of writing that surprisingly seems to improve over the years (a rare trait for Anglo-Saxon bands).
The first release "You're All I Have" (a moderately upbeat track, suspended between the classic "uh uh uh-uh" chorus and a sharp, incisive refrain) gained good exposure here in Italy, thanks to its use in the advertising campaign of a well-known summer festival. The following "Hands Open" flows delightfully and will emerge as the most rock piece of the album, thanks to its no-frills guitar riff. "Chasing Cars" is among the most beautiful ballads released last year, with its melodic crescendo and lighter-worthy refrain, while "Shut Your Eyes" is a guitar pop harmless yet pleasant Coldplay-like track. "Beginning To Get To Me" raises the bar and introduces us to "You Could Be Happy", a sort of lullaby seemingly accompanied by a music box.
Again, Chris Martin makes an appearance in a piano ballad like "Make This Go On Forever", which nevertheless erupts into a guitar whirl in the beautiful finale. "Set The Fire To The Third Bar" features the gentle participation of the "artistic sister" Martha Wainwright, a very special slow piece played on the intertwined vocals of the singers, accompanied by a delicate piano at first and a very particular (yet never invasive) rhythm in the end.
"Headlight On Dark Roads" retraces the theme of "You're All I Have" but presents a more impactful melodic riff, unlike the stunning "Open Your Eyes", filled with tons of U2 influence. "The Finish Line" closes the album in a subdued manner, where everything is in its place, and the quality of the offered tracks is decidedly above average.
We hope that Lightbody and company won't fall into that artistic gentrification that has mercilessly struck many of their more illustrious colleagues.
Tracklist Lyrics Samples and Videos
03 Chasing Cars (04:27)
We'll do it all
Everything
On our own
We don't need
Anything
Or anyone
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
I don't quite know
How to say
How I feel
Those three words
Are said too much
They're not enough
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life
Let's waste time
Chasing cars
Around our heads
I need your grace
To remind me
To find my own
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life
All that I am
All that I ever was
Is here in your perfect eyes, they're all I can see
I don't know where
Confused about how as well
Just know that these things will never change for us at all
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
05 It's Beginning to Get to Me (04:35)
I wanted something
That's purer than the water
Like we were
It's not there now
Ineloquence and anger
Are all we have
Like Saturn's rings
An icy loop around me
Too hard to hold
Lash out first
At all the things we don't like
Or understand
And it's beginning to get to me
That I know more of the stars and sea
Than I do of what's in your head
Barely touching in our cold bed
Are you beginning to get my point
That all this fighting with aching joints
Is doing nothing but tire us out
And no one knows what this fight's about
The answer phone
The lonely sound of your voice
Frozen in time
I only need
The compass that you gave me
To guide me on
And it's beginning to get to me
That I know more of the stars and sea
Than I do of what's in your head
Barely touching in our cold bed
Are you beginning to get my point
That all this fighting with aching joints
Is doing nothing but tire us out
And no one knows what this fight's about
It's so thrilling but also wrong
Don't have to prove that you are so strong
'Cause I can carry you on my back
After our enemies attack
I tried to tell you before I left
But I was screaming under my breath
You are the only thing that makes sense
Just ignore all this present tense
We need to feel breathless with love
And not collapsed under its weight
I'm gasping for the air to fill
My lungs with everything I've lost
We need to feel breathless with love
And not collapsed under its weight
I'm gasping for the air to fill
My lungs with everything I've lost
06 You Could Be Happy (03:02)
You could be happy and I won't know
But you weren't happy the day I watched you go
And all the things that I wish I had not said
Are played in loops 'til it's madness in my head
Is it too late to remind you how we were
And not our last days of silent, screaming, blur
Most of what I remember makes me sure
I should have stopped you from walking out the door
You could be happy, I hope you are
You made me happier than I'd been by far
Somehow everything I own smells of you
And for the tiniest moment it's all not true
Do the things that you always wanted to
Without me there to hold you back, don't think, just do
More than anything I want to see you girl
Take a glorious bite out of the whole world
07 Make This Go On Forever (05:47)
Please don't let this turn into something it's not
I can only give you everything I've got
I can't be as sorry as you think I should
But I still love you more than anyone else could
All that I keep thinking throughout this whole flight
Is it could take my whole damn life to make this right
The splintered mast I'm holding on won't save me long
Because I know fine well that what I did was wrong
The last girl and the last reason to make this last for as long as I could
The first kiss and the first time that I felt connected to anything
The weight of water, the way you taught me to look past everything I have ever learned
The final word in the final sentence you ever uttered to me was "love"
We have got through so much worse than this before
What's so different this time that you can't ignore
You say it is much more than just my last mistake
And we should spend some time apart for both our sakes
The last girl and the last reason to make this last for as long as I could
The first kiss and the first time that I felt connected to anything
The weight of water, the way you told me to look past everything I have ever learned
The final word in the final sentence you ever uttered to me was "love"
The last girl and the last reason to make this last for as long as I could
The first kiss and the first time that I felt connected to anything
The weight of water, the way you taught me to look past everything I have ever learned
The final word in the final sentence you ever uttered to me was "love"
And I don't know where to look
My words just break and melt
Please just save me from this darkness
Please just save me from this darkness
And I don't know where to look
My words just break and melt
Please just save me from this darkness
Please just save me from this darkness
09 Headlights on Dark Roads (03:30)
For once I want to be the car crash
Not always just the traffic jam
Hit me hard enough to wake me
And lead me wild to your dark roads
Oo
Oo
Oo
Oo
CHORUS
Headlights before me
So beautiful, so clear
Reach out and take it
'Cause I'm so tired of all ths fear
My tongue is lost, oh, I can't tell you
Please just see it in my eyes
I pull up thorns from our ripped bodies
And let the blood fall in my mouth
Oo
Oo
Oo
Oo
CHORUS
CHORUS
Headlights
Headlights
10 Open Your Eyes (05:41)
All this feels strange and untrue
And I won't waste a minute without you
My bones ache, my skin feels cold
And I'm getting so tired and so old
The anger swells in my guts
And I won't feel these slices and cuts
I want so much to open your eyes
'Cause I need you to look into mine
CHORUS
Tell me that you'll open your eyes
Tell me that you'll open your eyes
Tell me that you'll open your eyes
Tell me that you'll open your eyes
Get up, get out, get away from these liars
'Cause they don't get your soul or your fire
Take my hand, knot your fingers through mine
And we'll walk from this dark room for the last time
Every minute from this minute now
We can do what we like anywhere
I want so much to open your eyes
'Cause I need you to look into mine
CHORUS
CHORUS
All this feels strange and untrue
And I won't waste a minute without you
11 The Finish Line (03:28)
The earth is warm next to my ear
Insect noise is all that I hear
A magic trick makes the world disappear
The skies are dark, they're dark but they're clear
A distant motorcade and suddenly there's joy
The snow and tickertape blurs all my senses numb
It's like the finish line where everything just ends
The crack of radios seems close enough to touch
Cold water, cleaning my wounds
A side parade, with a single balloon
I'm done with this, I'm counting to ten
Blue as seas, running to them
I feel like I am watching everything from space
And in a minute I hear my name and I wake
I think the finish line's a good place we could start
Take a deep breath, take in all that you could want
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Other reviews
By Adil
The task was carried out diligently and precisely, but the hopes of repeating the success of two years ago are reasonably remote.
Set The Fire To The Third Bar breaks the slight but palpable sense of monotony felt in the more introspective episodes of Eyes Open.
By Vivio
The songs on this album are indeed catchy from the start, but if listened to and re-listened to, they stay with you, giving you some beautiful sensation.
'Hands Open'... an excellent melody that immediately sticks in your head but above all a SONG in the true sense of the word, where the most important thing is to convey something intimate with the words.
