This is the third release from Cold Culprits I’ve reviewed – the first two being ‘We Will Bleed’ and ‘Candy Thief’ which I was really impressed by – and this is no different.
Again there’s an element of ‘I really really like this but for the life of me I don’t know why’. I admit that when this happens I find it irritating, I really dislike not being able to work out why I like a song.
The lyrics are somewhat sad. Andy of Cold Culprits says ‘’Setting Suns’ is the end of a relationship. Both lovers know it’s over. They’ve grown apart, but neither wants to leave. It’s a mutual and sorrowful understanding that the spark has died and the time has come to move on or resent each other forever’.
But these sometimes desolate words are sung over something that has a hint of New Wave, in a vocal which has a hint of punk. With warped and sometimes discordant synths and a guitar that is played on the edge of painful. So actually musically it suits the subject of the song perfectly.
I think I’m getting close to understanding why I like it as much as I do. It’s that the music suits the words and subject of the song. But there’s something else here. Bear with me. I have a guilty pleasure, I rather love art-rock, I like the way that art-rock songs (and I guess I’m talking old school art-rock here) are a performance of the song, that musically, vocally and lyrically the songs are taken as far as they will go, and then further. ‘Setting Suns’ has that. It has that theatrical thing going on.
Each Cold Culprits’ release is another step along a musical journey. Andy is very much treading his own path. This step – ‘Setting Suns’ – is yet another impressive song. Can’t wait for the next step.
