Chloe - Grouplove (Single)

It’s amazing how certain things, such as songs and smells, can really take you back to an earlier time in your life or to a different place. For me, the song ‘Colours’ by Grouplove will always remind me of the four or so months I spent living in Leipzig in Germany. Every time I hear it I am filled with nostalgia for that city, and remember the sunny days I spent at the university or walking or running around the place I came to know and love so well. Now, roughly a year later, I still listen to this song and this band on a very regular basis, but the memories of when I first used to listen to it still remain. That particular song came from their self-titled EP and I grew to love all six of its tracks and played them almost all the time, and so I was very keen to buy their first full length album when it came out later last year. ‘Never Trust A Happy Song’ lived up to the excellence of their first album and is one that I still listen to almost constantly several months after its release. One of the songs that I grew to love the most from that album was ‘Chloe’, whose ridiculous happy tune and lyrics made me love it as much as the tracks I adored from the original EP.

Grouplove

As with most bands I grow to love, I was introduced to Grouplove by my boyfriend. Although an American band, Grouplove played a few gigs in the UK and my boyfriend actually met and went out drinking with them after some shows they did in Glasgow last year. He really enjoyed their music and so put me on to them and I fell I love with their EP very quickly. In terms of style, they’ve been compared to Modest Mouse (who I’m also a great fan of) by many critics. Their first album, ‘Never Trust a Happy Song’, was released last year and one of its singles, ‘Tongue Tied’, featured on an Apple iPod Touch advert in 2011.

Never Trust A Happy Song

Grouplove seem to be suggesting with this album title that we shouldn’t trust a word of it, as it certainly is an album filled with happy songs. Well, they’re all songs that make me feel very happy, anyway. Almost every single song is ridiculously upbeat and cheery, while all sounding different and catchy in their own way, with brilliant lyrics delivered by exceptional musical talent. There are also a couple of slower songs, such as ‘Slow’ (unsurprisingly), ‘Betty’s a Bombshell’ and ‘Close Your Eyes and Count to Ten’, which balance out the faster, cheerier songs on the album, giving it more depth and contrast.

Chloe

My favourite track that is new to the album would have to be ‘Chloe’. It’s just… fab. I really, truly love this song, and am in fact finding it hard to continue writing this review whilst listening to it as I want to dance around to it too much. It’s often been my song of choice of late when I need something to cheer me up a bit: not to give you too much of an insight to my life, but I do occasionally listen to this in my room and dance around with my toy penguin, and I feel so much better. I love this song so much that I actually want to have a daughter, call her Chloe, and play this song to her all the time in the hope that it inspires her to ‘go where [she wants] to go’ in life and all the other great things included in the lyrics. The beat in this song is incredible, and the rhythm is such that you can’t help but want to get up and dance to it.
Even the first line, ‘Dim the lights, dim the lights, dim the lights low, you can come and join me sit around the piano’, sets the cheery atmosphere for this song, and makes me actually want to go and join the singer and sing this song over and over again. The chorus is also lyrically simple but inspiring, with its conviction that we can ‘go where we want to go, say what we want to say and do what we want to do’. This song never fails to put a smile on my face and I believe it’s a combination of the fast rhythm, happy melody, talented musicians and optimistic lyrics that has this effect on me.

Conclusion

This is a fantastic song by an excellent band and is one that I can recommend very highly. If you’ve been interested in this song following reading my review, you can give this song a listen on Youtube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_Ic1NL4a​vs to see what you think of it. I have also written a review of ‘Colours’, another one of their excellent tracks, and the full album that this song comes from, and heartily encourage you all to give this band a listen and potentially fall in love with them and buy their album.