Coming off the blazing success of their album Eyes Open and having enough of the country lie with them and just forget the world"" as instructed by their hit song ""Chasing Cars,"" Snow Patrol return to the music scene with their newest album, A Hundred Million Suns.
A solid sequel to their previous hits, each song on Snow Patrol's new album is done on a very grand scale. Everything is very loud, very powerful and very full of repeated guitar chords. When the songs aren't too busy making allusions to various topics of astronomy - two songs have astronomy names, ""If There's A Rocket Tie Me To It"" and ""The Planets Bend Between Us,"" and others are chock-full of metaphors about rockets - there is a distant echo of Coldplay in their music. With both bands composing the power ballads that are so popular today, you can't help but hear a tiny bit of ""Viva la Vida"" in the back of your head.
But that isn't to say that A Hundred Million Suns isn't original or unworthy of note. Snow Patrol clearly tried to turn a corner with their latest album and, although the turn might have only been a slight one, the record, thankfully, isn't a compilation of 11 songs eerily similar to ""Chasing Cars.""
Although the album as a whole is strong, there isn't one song that stands out on the record particularly more than the others, which does make it difficult to tell which one will be featured on the ""Grey's Anatomy"" season finale. There are, however, several tracks that hold their own and then some.
A Hundred Million Suns'""Crack the Shutters"" is one of the more prominent tracks on the album. Lead vocalist and guitarist Gary Lightbody coos about a love he has and his addiction to this lover's beauty, murmuring, ""And just watch you as the rays / tangle up around your face and body, / I could sit for hours / finding new ways to be awed each minute, / 'Cause the daylight seems to want you / just as much as I want you."" It's the album's best love song and does a great job capturing the intensity of attraction.
The record's single, ""Take Back The City,"" is a more daring rock ballad about the love of city life versus the dangers that the city holds. Lightbody chants how he is chewed up by a city and spat out days later, but still loving the place enough to have no doubts. As the song plays, it feels as if you should be driving through the streets of Times Square with your head sticking out of a limo sunroof. The song paints an attractive image that the listener wants to be a part of.
Overall, A Hundred Million Suns is a respectable album that does the trick. Its sound is Snow Patrol's own unique genre, but one that will be appreciated and heard by the masses. There are melodies that are easy to stroll along to, while others prefer to shake the listeners at their cores and get them excited about love and life.
Although A Hundred Million Suns might be slightly over-edited and, at times, forced, the pros definitely outweigh the cons, and this release would make an excellent addition to any Snow Patrol library.
