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The Hepburns, How the Fallen Are Mighty

review by dave heaton

At its start, How the Fallen Are Mighty momentarily sounds like ‘70s TV theme song, fitting for a band with pop style and a sardonic sense of humor. They specialize in melodic pop songs with horns, keyboards, and a sound that strolls through the decades, taking in ‘50s pop balladry, ‘60s Kinks-ish pop/rock, film scores (like those of cops and robber films), good old-fashioned drinking songs, doo-wop backing vocals, and soft-pop larks in the park.

They seem to be poking fun at anyone and everyone. There’s the writer who thinks life doesn’t exist beyond what he writes (“Writer Friend”) and the lover who keeps a spreadsheet of his conquests (“One More Notch on the Bedpost”). “What I’m finding creepy is that you record their names / you chalk the legless and the sleepy in your sex hall of fame”, Matt Jones memorably sings. There’s songs about the disconnect between what people say and think (“Nobody Loves Me”) and about the overall separations and divisions among groups of people. They seem very aloof at first, until you realize how often the target is themselves. Or at least that they’re not excepting themselves, in any way, from their roll-call of frailties and hypocrisy. “Growing Old” somehow seems especially personal. Getting older, they note, is “like meeting someone you’ve forgotten.”

{www.radiokhartoum.com}


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