CD Reviews

As Tall As Lions

Triple Crown

By SHARON STEEL | September 5, 2006

3.0 Stars

I’m not sure what sort of albums Jeff Buckley would be making if he were still alive. As Tall As Lions seem to think that his oft-worshipped vocals would do a lot better over stadium-ready atmospheric dream pop than over a lonely guitar. They might be right. ATAL could easily be NME’s latest Manchester buzz boys, except they’re from Long Island, following the tradition of suburban NY scenesters playing to Britpop heroes across the pond. UK festivals haven’t called yet, but the bloggers are all over this four-piece outfit whose sleeper of a third album has left me unable to listen to anything else. There’s something about frontman Daniel Nigro’s staggering range and blissed-out tenor — which wouldn’t be out of place in a sacred choral ensemble — that justifies ATAL’s humdrum lyrics. Buckley devotees may turn their noses up, but Nigro can match him belt for belt, and he sells gag-worthy emo couplets better than Keane or Snow Patrol ever could. Besides, he delivers them with such grace and passion, it’s as if someone’s shitty high-school poem had edited itself into a magnum opus. This album has zero filler, and the midsection — “Ghost of York,” “Love, Love, Love (Love, Love),” “Milk and Honey” — is so saturated with joyous piano trills and sublime choruses, you’ll be gorging on REWIND/REPEAT. When a band move this much this fast, a little indulgence is par for the course.

Topics: CD Reviews , Snow Patrol, As Tall As Lions, As Tall As Lions, More

| More

Most Popular

The Current Issue

Table of Contents

Cover Archive

Masthead | Authors | Contact us

Blogs

Where To Follow Me
Talking Politics | March 24, 2013 at 11:09 AM

Mo Takes His Turn
March 21, 2013 at 12:59 PM

[Q&A] KMFDM's Sascha Konietzko on art, Columbine and having balls
On The Download | March 18, 2013 at 3:22 PM

See this film series: The Belmont World Film Series @ Studio Cinema in Belmont
Outside The Frame | March 18, 2013 at 11:00 AM

See this film: This is Spinal Tap [with post-film talk by expert from Acoustical Society of America] @ the Coolidge
March 17, 2013 at 12:00 PM

ARTICLES BY SHARON STEEL

YO, JONNY! THE LOVE SONG OF JONNY VALENTINE | February 05, 2013
Sometime after becoming a YouTube megastar and crashing into the cult of personality that has metastasized in contemporary society, Teddy Wayne's 11-year-old bubblegum idol Jonny Valentine is hanging out in his dressing room getting a blow job from a girl who doesn't even like his music.

LENA DUNHAM AND HBO GET IT RIGHT | April 13, 2012
When a new television show chronicling the lives of young women arrives, it tends to come packaged with the promise that it will expertly define them, both as a generation and a gender.

EUGENIDES'S UPDATED AUSTEN | October 12, 2011
For his long-awaited third novel, Jeffrey Eugenides goes back to look at love in the '80s — and apparently decides that it's a lot like love in the early 19th century.

REVIEW: RINGER | September 08, 2011
Sixty seconds into the CW's new psychological thriller Ringer, star Sarah Michelle Gellar is seen running from a masked attacker in the darkness.

LOVE'S LEXICOGRAPHER | February 10, 2011
As the editorial director at Scholastic, David Levithan is surrounded by emotional stories about adolescents. Being overexposed to such hyperbolic feelings about feelings could easily turn a writer off pursuing such ventures himself — despite the secrets he may have picked up along the way.