Geoff Westen’s album, “Music For My Friends”, thumps onto the scene like a dropped box of heavy disco balls – all shiny potential energy and the slight threat of chaos. It aims for that classic pop song euphoria, the kind designed to rattle car speakers and fuel late-night dance floors, an “aural assault” as Westen puts it. And it does pulse with energy, a insistent, hard-pop beat pushing relentlessly forward.
But peel back the chrome plating, and the lyrical heart is pumping something darker, something almost bruisingly human. We’re thrown headfirst into a whirlwind of obsessive clinging (“You will stay!”), followed by the sharp, glass-shattering sound of rejection and blame. It’s an emotional U-turn performed at speed, leaving you momentarily disoriented. Where did that sweet melody just go? Oh, it’s now twisting around a lyric that feels like a slammed door.
From that wreckage, the album scrabbles towards escape. It chases impulsive joy, ducks into dreamlike romances that feel hazy, maybe unreliable. There’s this peculiar fascination with the city’s flow, particularly the subway – seeking anonymity or perhaps connection in that underground river of strangers. It reminds me, oddly, of the specific smell of ozone and damp concrete before a train arrives, a scent that always feels pregnant with possibility or just… mundane delay. This search escalates, craving transcendence through snatched encounters, altered states, a frantic dance against dissatisfaction. Even love, when seemingly captured, feels viewed through thick, rose-tinted glass, hyper-idealized, almost alien.
The effect is bracing, like mainlining sugar while reading someone’s diary. The rock-pop chassis is sturdy, built for movement, yet the narrative running through it is all jagged edges and feverish searching. It makes you want to move, absolutely, but you’re left wondering: are we dancing towards something ecstatic, or just furiously away from the wreckage?
