Intimacy

I’m not the first to comment on the poorly chosen title of Bloc Party’s new CD Intimacy — Urgency would be more like it. Beyond the album's sound-the-alarm tone (including the brassy sirens on menacing first single “Mercury”), the band was so eager to put out the record that they failed to include one of its better songs — current UK single “Talons” isn't even on Intimacy. It’s not like the album suffers. From the get-go, Bloc Party comes on new-wave strong, blasting through such big-beat numbers as “Halo,” “Trojan Horse” and especially “One Month Off,” a track that out-Metrics Metric. And the more “intimate” tracks, like “Signs” and “Biko,” add welcome, albeit piercing, relief. I was expecting an Interpol-like fall from relevancy on this, the third record from a musical career that began so explosively — Silent Alarm, their hard-act-to-follow debut, was named NME’s top album of 2005, after all. But Intimacy is no step back for Bloc Party — just don’t call it a love record. B+
Bloc Party: One Month Off (mp3) (buy it)
Bloc Party: Biko (mp3) (buy it)