The Church - Uninvited, Like the Clouds Review
by Eric Bodrero
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Uninvited, Like the Clouds is at once familiar with any real fan of the Church with the cool, laid-back and airy vocals and dreamy, sometimes crunchy layered guitars and moody production magic that we've all come to know and love. Following 2004's surprisingly excellent Forget Yourself, the Church just keeps cranking out album after wonderfully surreal album, and for a band that has been together for as long as they have-avoiding burnout and redundancy-this is quite an accomplishment.Opener "Block" starts with Steve Kilbey's unforgettable and better-with-age vocals and songwriting, a simple bass hook, and pensive multi-layered guitars that start simple but finally mesh with a profusion of intertwined Peter Koppes-laden guitar and wizardry. Radio friendly "Unified Field" follows with a single guitar lick repeated over and over again with a chorus of vocals from the rest of the band embedded throughout with a fresh brilliance. "Space Needle" showcases the bands' intelligent songwriting skills and the fluid way the band blends together and thoroughly pinpoints each member's talent. "Overview" throws in some piano for good measure, and the guitars! The Church certainly have a flair for throwing songs together and making them sound coherent, consistently good, and easy to listen to. The rest of the album shimmers with the same formula they've used since at least the mid '80's, and it works astonishingly well, even after all these years. I would rank this album up there with '92's Priest=Aura, my favorite Church album. The whole record is wonderfully produced, amazingly fluid, and astoundingly listenable and enjoyable, resurfacing the fact that, despite the success of '88's Starfish and the "Under the Milky Way" days of MTV's '120 minutes', the Church is one of rock's most underrated and forgotten bands in history. I think it's high time we award them the credit and honor they deserve.
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The Church - Uninvited, Like the Clouds Label:Cooking Vinyl
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