Border_Mind said:

This is a great track,  I can't help feeling the live version was more powerful though, you have never heard electric guitars like it in Goldfrapp before, and this doesn't translate onto record so well.

I guess I am the only one who is slightly reminded of Massive Attack Tear Drop at times with this song, it's only a vague reminder though.

Alvar and Thea are probably my favorite tracks on this album!

It's weird - there are times I wish they'd really pushed it as hard on the cd as they had live...but other times it sounds just right as it doesn't need to be so loud to stand out from the rest of the final album.

It's probably my fastest growing track, that's for sure. It's so evocative!

Border_Mind said:

The_Carpathian said:

It's weird - there are times I wish they'd really pushed it as hard on the cd as they had live...but other times it sounds just right as it doesn't need to be so loud to stand out from the rest of the final album.

It's probably my fastest growing track, that's for sure. It's so evocative!

This is very true, it probably would have sounded a bit out of place if it was as HEAVY as the live version. It does leave me hoping for a double live album though. I would like to see a nice live album Tales Of Us tracks from Manchester and New York on one disc and the next disc compiling other classics from across the Tales Of Us tour perhaps ;)

oh, if manchester and/or the other gigs were put onto cd, i'd import it in a heartbeat..

now on alvar,

this one, like laurel, very early and very quickly left a vivid impression...the whole thing's Druidic, as in Stonehenge, and more pagan-sounding than all of st.. in a single word, "hypnotic" is indeed the word to describe this song...

please excuse my overactive imagination, but with alvar i imagine death by bog..  a woman being lead to her execution a la Hester Prynne in a procession from the heath to her final resting place... seriously, i imagined this before i noticing that "I want to swim your silk black skin to the floor"...

Yes. They say, "I loves me gay boys!"

Over and over.

stevil said:

has anyone yet reversed the backing vocals on Alvar yet?  

All I'm hearing is "Alvar, you're in my..." then other humming and slurring. It's trance inducing that's for sure.

This reminds me of Joy Luck Club by Massive Attack but I think this is my favourite off the album.

This is actually the first song I heard leaked before TOU was released. I was immediately taken with the guitars, and effects used on the vocal. I had it on repeat for some time..trying to figure out lyrics. "I want to swim your silk black skin to the floor"... Idk, it suggests something erotic to me..a woman sliding onto and getting lost in what her lover is wearing. But then again, I have a dirty mind..no surprise there. I think it may be my favorite too.