Albums of 2009: #19 Idlewild - Post Electric Blues

Idlewild have a special place in my heart. Back in 2002 I was just 14, struggling to define who I was, learning all the time about what I liked. Until that year music had just really been a distraction, I didn't go out of my way to hear it, it didn't excite me, or make me feel anything.

But then one day I was listening to Jo Whiley on Radio 1 and it all changed. She played You Held The World In Your Arms by Idlewild and suddenly I 'got' music. It thrilled me and since then Idlewild have been a permanent fixture in my favourite few bands.

Annoyingly, I missed the band's early glory days, just getting into them around the time of their last great album, The Remote Part. Since then the Scots have mellowed considerably and though they are still capable of thrilling and visceral live shows, their albums haven't really pressed my buttons in recent years.

But luckily, Post Electric Blues was a vast improvement. Readers and Writers threatened briefly to be the band's biggest hit in years, City Hall became their catchiest track in, well, ever, and for the first time they achieved that difficult balance of the ROOOCCK and the lilting folk melodies that singer Roddy Woomble had grown closer to over the years.

Rekindling my faith in a once glorious band is enough to get this record a nod in the top 20.

Read my original review at The Music Magazine.