Snow Patrol Eyes Open (Fiction/Polydor) £12.99
One feature of soppy, anthemic rock is the notion of redemption it seeks to nurture; a manly hug that says, 'We've all made mistakes but it's going to be OK.' Soppy, anthemic rock appears able to redeem entire careers, too. Take Embrace. Around the time of their 1997 'All You Good Good People' single, they were pegged as the new Oasis. Eventually plummeting out of favour, they were rescued commercially in 2004 by a Coldplay song.
Snow Patrol started life 10 years ago as a likeable if ineffective indie outfit. After two largely unbought albums, singer Gary Lightbody became better known as the ringleader of the Reindeer Section, a Glasgow supergroup who made two mildly charming, if not quite chartbusting, albums. Around 2002, Snow Patrol decided they wanted to sell records. Final Straw, their third album, exchanged niche interests for soppy, anthemic rock. The calculation paid off. Within months they had a clutch of hit singles and were onstage at Live 8.
Eyes Open is even more emotive and stadium-friendly. Lightbody draws on his personal life for a set of candid, self-flagellating songs. The band have replaced their founding bassist and added a keyboard player who augments the big Celtic confessional sound with more electronic textures. Their imminent single, 'You're All I Have', looks set to continue their success.
But Eyes Open pivots on the kind of big chiming guitars and obvious builds to climactic choruses that work crudely and add little to the lexicon of rock. The high point is Lightbody's duet with Martha Wainwright, 'Set the Fire to the Third Bar'. Their mesmerising vocals recall Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush's 'Don't Give Up', and provide a tantalising glimpse of how a commercial song might retain some mystery.
Lightbody, it seems, hasn't entirely given up on the idea of cred. 'Put Sufjan Stevens on,' he sings on 'Hands Open', and follows that reference to the Michigan singer-songwriter with 'Make This Go On Forever', which filches Stevens's massed choruses and multiple parts. For all the rewards of populism, it seems Lightbody is torn about churning out anthems. Perhaps plugging Stevens is a small nod to a nagging indie conscience; a token redemption.
