 | ON: Content is age-appropriate for kids this age. |
 | PAUSE: Know your child; some content may not be right for some kids. |
 | OFF: Not age-appropriate for kids this age. |
 | NOT FOR KIDS: Not appropriate for kids any age. |
Some Loud Thunder
- By Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
- Genre: Indie Rock
Common Sense Media says
Avant-garde music makes for okay CD.
Parents say
Kids say
What parents need to know
Parents need to know that the songs on this album are unusual and dense in this overdubbed production. The band never presents us with violently explicit or crude lyrics, but it makes for a strange, abstract-beyond-belief trip in sound nonetheless. There are references to Satan, who requests partygoers to dance (in "Satan Said Dance"), the randomly placed line "my fair-lady pill pop" (from "Yankee Go Home"), slightly morbid allusions to politics and death in "Mama, Won't You Keep Them Castles in the Air and Burning?" ("And I'm touched by the same sad feeling of dread/Just to know that you can't wait to see me dead…I'm at the end/This here my rope"), and the word "cock" appears in "Arm and Hammer."
What's the story?
The myth of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah started in 2005, stirred by buzz that they evaded record labels and PR agencies to make a six-figure profit through Internet hoopla alone. But that was before they fell short of delivering a sophomore album that consummated sublime potential. SOME LOUD THUNDER is the downside of premature indie rock glory: The band falls prey and strays from their organic music roots too much. Disjointed, stranger-than-David Byrne chops, psychedelic delicacy, jittery wit, pumping rapture, and aquatic harmonies all remotely exist in glimmers like "Emily Jean Stock" with charming lyrics ("There's no one else/there is no one quite so perfect") and the fantastic, haunting "Yankee Go Home": "Senses burn man/when the deck-hand/plays a flute which/reminds me of you."
Is it any good?
Some Loud Thunder is a warbled, far-reaching retreat from Clap Your Hands' skittish debut. Deep under squandered, distorted production you will find an energetic band with extensive talent, seriously experimenting with sound. But lack of crispness bogs this album down to hazy muck in problematic tracks like the unfinished, amateur air of "Underwater (you and me)" and odd dance-party number "Satan Said Dance."
What families can talk about
Families can talk about the art of writing lyrics and how they don't necessarily have to make sense to everyone, but can be written in the vein of stream-of-consciousness or uncanny poetics. Families can also compare Clap Your Hands Say Yeah to less complex, more tangible indie-rock bands. What do you hear probing the background of this album? Cowbells, gawky guitar, static synthesizer are all magical elements of the musical potency. What images do they evoke in your music-listening experience?
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AGE
Not nearly as good as their first CD
CYHSY's first CD was much better compared to this follow-up, which feels a bit more disjointed and less congealed together. The first Cd was still weird in the way the songs went and the fact that the singer sounded like he was taking something when he sang. But it was still addictive music. As is this CD, just not in a nearly as well-polished way. However, they also conitinue to be almost completely clean, with just mild language in only one track. Personally, if you have not listened to their first CD, I would go for that one over Some Loud Thunder.
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| Artist: | Clap Your Hands Say Yeah |
| Release date: | January 30, 2007 |
| Label: | Clap Your Hands Say |
| Genre: | Indie Rock |
| Parental advisory: | No |
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