People Are Strange

Keane have always gotten pissed on.

At the start of their career, the then trio were labelled Coldplay lite (I never really got this ’cause weren’t Coldplay already lite?), Coldplay imitators (again, didn’t get this ’cause I was under the impression Coldplay were already imitating Travis) and perhaps worst of all, corporate rock.

Somewhere Only We Know and Everybody’s Changing were massive in 2004. You walked into a mall, you heard one, if not both singles. You took a bus, you heard them. And yet, if you read the NME or Uncut, you’d be under the impression that no one was actually buying Keane’s music. That the whole massive thing was just part of a brilliant promo/marketing exercise. The problem with this theory is that one, marketing guys -- or at least the guys who market rock bands -- aren’t very smart. And two, people did buy Hopes and Fears. At least 2.7 million people in the UK and God knows how many more outside. But, of course, the pissing on continued.

Things didn’t improve with the next record Under the Iron Sea (Tim Rice-Oxley’s cinematic, bigger-budget album that may have drawn on fairy tale, myth and XTC but save for Is It Any Wonder? wasn’t particularly memorable) and before you knew it, Keane were getting pissed on for just existing. 

Singer Tom Chaplin admits his addiction to booze and drugs... pissed on.

Tom checks himself into rehab… pissed on.

Third album references ’80s synth pop... pissed on

Band record with K’naan... pissed on. Although, hmm, in this instance, Keane probably deserved it. I mean, the Wavin' Flag dude?! Seriously, guys?!

Earlier this month, Keane released Strangeland, their fourth studio LP, and you don’t need me to tell you that the so-called tastemakers all hate it. The BBC. NME. Slant. The Independent though, was particularly scathing.

Wrote reviewer Andy Gill: “The vaunting piano and empty clichés of You Are Young set the tone of bogus anthemic uplift, full of hollow promises.”

Now, while I’m not about to debate Mr Gill’s views, I do have this to say: Keane may be boring. Keane may be safe. They have never been cool and will probably never be spoken off in the manner reserved for, oh I dunno, the Arctic Monkeys? But what Keane, collectively, do know how to do is write amazingly melodic pop songs that guarantee tugging of heartstrings and repeated plays. And if that’s bogus, if that’s hollow promise, I’ll take a second serving, please.

Highlights: Silenced by the Night for sure, Sovereign Light Cafe and oh, the simply gorgeous Watch How You Go.

Score: Four out of five stars. One star held back for the occasionally juvenile lyrics. I do not care. “If I am a river, you are the ocean” is never forgivable.