A Year to Demonstrate

A Year to Demonstrate Artist: The Elanors
Label: Isidore Records
Category: Music


Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Media: Audio CD
Number Of Discs: 1


UPC: 656605981222
EAN: 0656605981222
ASIN: B0007NH26K


Release Date: 2005-03-08

A Year to Demonstrate


Related Categories:

General General
Categories | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music
General General
Categories | Rock | Styles | Music
Pop Rock Pop Rock
Categories | Pop | Styles | Music

Tracks:

  1. Roads to Freedom
  2. Poets
  3. Tumble into Fall
  4. Designs
  5. Glances
  6. Hold on Me
  7. Day Like Today
  8. Gunfire
  9. Completely
  10. Lost a Seam
  11. On All Its Strings

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars fresh, bold, yet also intimate.......2005-04-13

The Elanors are an idependent rock band currently home-based in Champaign, Illinois--what some might call the Midwest's Fertile Crescent of indie rock. Most people appreciate The Elanors for their elegance and balance: as is rarely the case for even more well-established bands, there's no trade-off between lyrical depth and musical ingenuity, approachable stylization and unique arrangements (e.g. the primary instruments featured are piano, drums, and baritone guitar while the chief percussive instrument on one of the songs is a typewriter).

Nevertheless, I liked this title best for its sense of intimacy. The chemistry between the members of the band (a husband, wife, and family-friend trio) draws you into the songs and imbues them with an immediacy and vitality rare to the often tired genre of rock'n'roll. Like an excellent film or a good book, you find yourself caring about the thing to which you've lent your attention rather than unreflectively consuming it; you go beyond a perusal of its material to an investigation of the hearts and minds of those who fashioned it.

Few albums can do this sort of thing because few bands have the necessary command over the basic elements of good music to approach a transcendental statement. Aside from all the other fine elements of A Year to Demonstrate, it's worth the listen for this reason alone.

4 out of 5 stars

Music Album:

  1. Sanctimonious Pt.1 ~ Halo
  2. Music to Celebrate Your Wedding ~ Various Artists
  3. Seamonsters ~ The Wedding Present
  4. Pourvu Que Ca Dure ~ Sandie Shaw
  5. Then: 1986-1987 ~ Various Artists
  6. Manfred Mann's Earth Band ~ Manfred Mann's Earth Band
  7. Arashi Syndrome ~ Deathline International
  8. A Long Way to Nowhere ~ The Parkinsons
  9. Glorified Magnified ~ Manfred Mann's Earth Band
  10. Freddie & the Dreamers ~ Freddie & the Dreamers

Music Album

Music Album

Music

Out of the Forrest ~ Jimmy Forrest

Saturday Night Function ~ Sackville All Stars

Live at Jorgie's Jazz Club 1961 ~ Wes Montgomery

Yesterday ~ Junior Mance

Magical Moments of Rhythm ~ Zakir Hussain

Millennium: Tim Maia ~ Tim Maia

Zwei Zoote Minsche ~ Brings

Danca Cigana ~ Ednaldo Queiroz

Rz: the Best of Rhythm Zone ~ Various Artists

Lovers Bread: Beautiful Songs of Naomi Shemer ~ Various Artists