by Paul D

Created on: April 05, 2007   Last Updated: May 09, 2007

Reviewing 'A Weekend in the City', the second album from Bloc Party, it's hard to avoid the hackneyed phrases of a myriad other reviews. Foremost is 'sophomore effort', this being, as said, the band's second album. Like most 'sophomore efforts' that follow a successful, 'critically acclaimed' debut, the heat was on to build on that success.

As is common with second albums, the band can be heard to have matured, while sacrificing, perhaps, the spontaneity associated with youth. In other words, fewer melodies and less originality. Perhaps. But this is a band at the top of their game. Like any great music, a little effort is required on the part of the listener. Full appreciation requires a few plays, but your perseverance will be rewarded.

'A Weekend in the City' confirms Bloc Party at the forefront of the crop of 80's influenced rock bands, that includes Franz Ferdinand, The Killers and Kaiser Chiefs. The new wave-meets-MTV era aesthetic is unmistakable. Many tracks may leave you flailing with the question 'who does this remind me of'? Psychedelic Furs? English Beat? The Knack? That this sound is seeing a revival is unexpected and not a little mystifying. Fashion moves in mysterious ways. But second time around, and with the benefit of the intervening years, Nirvana, Oasis, Radiohead and many other seminal musical events, Bloc Party really are doing it so much better. There's a complexity that was entirely absent from the plastic sounds of the MTV generation. There are very few odes to teenage angst, unrequited love, girls on film. Their songs are rich in contemporary allusions befitting a post-9/11 world; and with pensive introspection, seeking self-knowledge in the face of the global crises of the day.

Take for example 'Hunting for Witches'. Irony is assumed in lyrics such as "Kill your middle class indecision. Now is not the time for liberal thought. So I go hunting for witches". Loss of innocence and paranoia is expressed in "90's, optimistic as a teen. Now it's terror. Airplanes crash into towers, into towers, crash into towers". Over dance pop reminiscent of Modern English's 'I Melt With You' (OK, that's maybe a stretch).

In the album's opening song 'Song For Clay', lead vocalist Kele Okereke repines that he's trying to be heroic in the face of all the 'surrounding history', and that "I enjoy and I devour flesh and wine and luxury, but in my heart I am lukewarm, nothing ever really touches me." In 'The Prayer' he pleads for validation for a rock star ego;

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