Miracle Mile
STRFKR
Polyvinyl Record Co.
I like synthpop. It is music made to entertain, and appeals to a soft spot in the hearts of music fans. At its best, the genre is catchy and danceable. Of course the “pop” side of the genre is important, although the best music is that which brings a unique approach to the form of the pop song.
Miracle Mile, the latest effort by Portland-based band STRFKR made me very conscious of the way a pop song is supposed to be formed. When I hear pop, I want well-mixed, catchy music that makes me want to return to it time after time. This release offers none of that.
The first time I listened to this album I felt frustrated. Songs like “Malmo” or “While I’m Alive” are fodder for music-criticism cliché “offensively inoffensive,” although looking at the band’s name, I have reached the decision that the band is just offensive. The music takes absolutely no risks, and I at no point felt as though I would want to return to it. The songs have incredibly forgettable melodies, and it would be hard to determine where the choruses come in, if it weren’t for the fact that they are usually constructed of the band whistling or shouting meaningless words.
This reaches a laughable climax with the aptly title “YA YA YA,” a song with literally half its lyrics in the title. After this we are given the unsettlingly boring “Fortune’s Fool,” a song which seems to suggest that the band never finished the song, extending a single verse for the song’s entire two minutes. The guitars are clean-cut, the drums hit softly, and the synthesizers sound like presets on something the band found at Value Village. The vocals are mumbled and the lyrics are uninteresting high-school diary fare.
I really don’t like being so pessimistic about an album, but I could not find anything that I enjoyed about Miracle Mile. The album is an unfortunate example of how almost anybody can release an album these days. Completely bland and lazy, I would not recommend this release to anybody.
