You can get off to a fast start. You can sustain your opener with the main course, not filler. But can you end on a high note? Sometimes I wonder if recording a strong closer is the most difficult thing to pull off when it comes to album rock. When it comes to the cream of the crop in music, I can think of more strong openers than strong closers. Nonetheless, I still have my favorites which I’ll be featuring on Mental Jukebox all month.
The beauty of Hopes And Fears extends beyond the fact that each song in itself is exceptional. The near-perfect sequence in which the tracks are ordered is just as essential. The album starts with a triumphant entrance in “Somewhere Only We Know”. From there, it follows an arc of catchy mid-tempo tracks (“This Is The Last Time”, “Bend & Break”), slows down briefly for a ballad (“We Might As Well Be Strangers”) before picking things up again (“Everything’s Changing”). This roller-coaster arc repeats itself, culminating in one of the band’s finest songs ever recorded: “Bedshaped”.
The song juxtaposes an icy intro on the synthesizer with the sweltering vocals in the chorus. And then there’s the unforgettable arpeggios on the piano that give the song an equal dose of hope and fear – a theme that Keane examines throughout the entire track list. In a big year for rock, “Bedshaped” and the entire Hopes And Fears album distinguished themselves by reimagining the delicacy and bravado of the piano.
“You'll follow me back With the sun in your eyes And on your own. Bedshaped on legs of stone.”