Track Listing

1. Beautiful To Watch
2. Illness
3. Passchendaele
4. Curse Of Saul
5. Alice
6. Good Life Salesman
7. Violent Man Lovesong
8. Last Day
9. Walk With Me
10. Leni
11. Turn It Back
12. Start/Stop

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #42992 in Music
• Released on: 2007-07-30
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .23 pounds

CD Description
'Control' is the debut album from indie-dance hopefuls, GoodBooks. A compelling mash-up of Hot Chip and Athlete, the album hums with great ideas, hooks and creative energy. Includes the singles 'Leni' and 'Passchendaele'.

Amazon.co.uk Artist Description
On their debut album Control, GoodBooks comfortably establish themselves as the most arresting and idiosyncratic new band of 2007. They have the angular intrigue of that great-lost art rock act The Auteurs, coupled with the nervy eclecticism of Talking Heads at their peak. They write profound and involving songs inspired by Kafka, terrorism, the Bible and--why not?-–lesbian crushes, while musically their rhythms are sinuous and kinetic, with mournful trumpets and clattering, vivid percussion. They really don't do ordinary at all. Only Guillemots come close in terms of a band so thoroughly in and of itself, and are consequently worth much more than mere cursory investigation. "Underneath the relatively complicated ideas that form most of our songs," Max says, "I think we are still a very acceptable pop act." "It’s true," Leo adds. "We have potential for widespread appeal, I reckon." Widespread, yes, and way beyond.

Customer Reviews

Scarily good
I love this CD, it is so scarily good. OK from their photos the band look like they're still at school, but if you don't get it now, in 10 or 20 years time you will be voting it to the top of polls of greatest lost debut albums & petitioning record companies to re-release it. It clearly sits there in an English prog rock/pop tradition, following in the footsteps of early Soft Machine, Caravan, Hatfield & The North, Robert Wyatt, Kevin Ayers, even Nick Drake & Syd Barrett. The singing is both effete & affecting, the musicianship belies their age.

Something a little different....but quite brilliant.
I bought this album on a bit of a whim. I'd heard Passchendaele, a song written about a soldier in the First World War, thought it sounded decent and took a risk on the album. Well, I wasn't disappointed. Several amazing tracks on the record including, Illness, Curse of Saul, Alice, Walk With Me, Leni..and plenty others. The lyrics are original and vary from lesbian crushes to a biblical story. However the thing that really appeals to me about the album is the shear catchyness of it all, without being repetitive. Great to get up and dance to.

Apparently it took them 2 years to make this album...time well spent in my opinion.

Go buy it! Now.
Really good - and real music too. I've listened to this on my CD, in the car and the ipod and everytime there is something new - it is well engineered and a real quality. Intelligent lyrics, something to follow, lots of content and I understand they do really good concerts - most of it is small gigs but they seem to have been all over Europe. A lot of talent for a young band - Walk With Me has some dark corners, Passchendale is a story that certainly fits most families - and maybe our generation. Curse of Saul is maybe about the labour government. OK the only mention of football is a bit odd. Alice is maybe about love and lesbians. If ths is 'post-modern' bring it on.