A friend recently introduced me to a band called The Blue Nile. I’m glad he did. Their first album A Walk Across the Rooftops is genius, and contains the brilliant title track as well as Tinseltown in the Rain – one of their (apparently) more well known numbers.
Sure, it sounds a little dated – they are, to an extent, a product of their time. But their ability to craft songs also sees them move and resonate beyond their time. Nothing in the music is superfluous – everything has its place, and the lyrics find true potency in their delivery. They often turn on one or two key images, and the trick which singer Paul Buchanan has mastered is to add new and interesting inflections in voice and meaning with each return. Same goes with the instrumentation. A beautiful example is Broken Loves – one of the most amazingly structured and performed songs I’ve heard in a while. Its sound is deceptively simple.
