Keane live goes for your inner emo
The march of big ticket Brit pop-rock acts continues. After Snow Patrol, now comes Keane, a four pieceband best known for their melodic, piano-driven ballads like “Somewhere Only We Know” and “Everybody’ Changing.”
Keane is presently composed of Tim Rice-Oxley on piano and synthesizers, drummer Richard Hughes, bassist Jesse Quin and vocalist/guitarist Tom Chaplin. The band was formed in 1997 with founding member and guitarist Dominic Scott leaving the group in 2001.
In the press briefing held on Monday, October 1, Tim Rice-Oxley said, “We play sad, melancholic songs to get the misery out. Most of the time, we’re okay. Some of the best songs are sad ones really. Most of the songs on the album are hopeful though.”
Hey, guitars!
Keane are on tour behind their latest and fourth studio release, “Strangeland”, which finds the band in a more upbeat mood. The wistful tracks, however, still get played a lot.
There’s the compellingly emotive “Silenced By The Night,” the bittersweet “Watch How You Go” and throwbacks to the old Keane sound, “Disconnected” and “Day Will Come.” A fine contrast is in the fist-pumping declarations in “Neon River.”
“Strangeland” is also the first time for the band to use guitars to tighten up the established piano-pop sound.
No longer wide-eyed teens
Tim told the press that the new album has no overarching theme: “When we started out, our music reflected how we felt trying to get a break. Now, I guess, we’re reflecting on how far we’ve achieved our dreams. We’re no longer wide-eyed teen-agers and now I think we’re also trying to make sense of our (musical) journey together.”
Surprisingly, the apparent mishmash in sound has led to another chart success, the fourth studio album in a row to top the number 1 spot starting with their debut “Hopes and Fears.”
Chaplin chalked it all up to growing up in a small town called Battle. He explained, “We shared a lot of experiences together. We had common influences like the Beatles, U2, the Pet Shop Boys, R.E.M., and Queen. As we got older, of course, each of us would go on to like other music.”
Not about being cool or popular
Rice-Oxley added, “What has tied us together are melodic songs, and we try to be honest when we write them. It’s about us. We’re not about being cool or being popular. It’s about how we navigate life as human beings. It’s not unique but it certainly sets us apart from other bands.”
Drummer Richard Hughes said their biggest dream “was to be huge and conquer the world. Right now, we’d like to think our goal is music that we can be proud of, one that connects with other people.
