Kings of Convenience - Declaration of Dependence

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/2c/KoC_Declaration_of_Dependence.jpg

Declaration of Dependence is the third album from Norwegian duo Kings of Convenience and it's also their first album in five years. It will be released on October, 20 2009 on Virgin Records.

1. 24-25
2. Mrs Cold
3. Me in You
4. Boat Behind
5. Rule My World
6. My Ship Isn't Pretty
7. Renegade
8. Power of Not Knowing
9. Peacetime Resistance
10. Freedom and Its Owner
11. Scars on Land
12. Second to Numb
13. Riot on an Empty Street

i love these guys and am impressed with their unbroken string of terrible album titles

what he said

very martin denny cover

this has leaked, looking very forward to hearing this.

this is really, really good. if you like what this band did acoustically before than you won't be disappointed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=df2K91QSqJE

awezzzzz so amped to get this what with fall crashing upon me

This is really nice.

really like this on first listen, esp. the first two songs. Riot On An Empty Street was one of those albums I've listened to over and over without getting tired of it. Hoping this one will be too.

I'm liking it a lot as well, but that's primarily because to me it feels like a return to form. I love the first one to pieces, but was very dissapointed by 'Riot'. I just couldn't get over that dreadful 'I'd Rather Dance With You' (ugh), for starters. I only really like 'Misread', 'Know-How' and 'The Build Up' (and like them a lot), but as an album it just didn't work for me. The new one though flows like the first album.

'I'd Rather Dance With You' is very precious to me but for reasons largely unrelated to the quality of the actual song.

Haven't quite been hooked by this yet, but I think a few more listens and I will be. Certainly the songs are seamlessly stitched together.

one of my favorite bands. love it.

Yeah I've been relying on Riot on An Empty Street for quiet moments in rough times for the last 5 years, it's gonna be a while before this has quite the same emotional resonance. But I like it so far.

sounds like sade

I always forget how boring they are unless they're being remixed.

eugh no remixes please, dude's voice does not mix well with teh dance musics

what? have you not heard his solo record or his dj kicks?

Not super huge club mixes or anything. I just want some beats and synths, the kind that dominated this:

http://dkpresents.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/erlend_oye.jpg

haven't heard Unrest. I like the quiet guitar/string arrangements on the KOC albums, though. they're a nice complement to the vocals.

i really like the production of much of album(and that of the other electronic stuff he did vox for (fred falke, morgan geist), i just don't think he has a good voice for that kind of stuff.

much of thatalbum (unrest i mean)

I'd rather hear Erlend sing that stuff than fucking Ben Gibbard.

i'd rather hear someone a little funkier sing that stuff

anyway, i don't want to divert the thread. looking forward to hearing this album

i don't agree. the remix of I Don't Know What I Can Save You From, the Morgan Geist cut on Unrest, Poor Leno + the other Royksopp tune, the Fred Falke...basically Erlend's vocals have been used to spectacular effect on most of the electronic tracks and remixes he's been featured on.

^^^ OTM. Both 'Unrest' and the KoC remix album 'Versus' are great!

his voice does have a somewhat affectless quality that I can imagine being good over a number of different templates. What I like about it mostly is its music-as-refuge quality (what Hoos mentions above about quiet moments in rough times)

I agree. It's probably also the reason I can hardly stomach a song like 'I'd Rather Dance With You'... Oye being quirky doesn't do it for me.

yes, that's the one song from Riot that I don't love.

the Morgan Geist cut on Unrest

one of my favorites

I can't explain why, but their albums always break my heart. There's something so sad about their songs.

i think that's their intent

Listening to the new album a few times, I started feeling sad remembering all the feelings I had when I listened to the last album. It's like a nostalgia trap.

Still don't love the new one. Guess i'll continue to play it until I do.

Still waiting for Erlend Øye's second electro solo album. Kings Of Convinience were interesting for about one album. Might have worked if they had gradually added more and more instruments for each album, but instead they are going to opposite way. Sorry.
And the songs aren't really all that strong either. A bit too "cyclic" and repetitive to work in such sparse arrangements.

Your logic makes no sense. The first album was mostly all acoustic guitars, the 2nd added the full band instrumentation and was certainly more full sounding. This one sounds exactly like the second so if anything you're argument should be they haven't progressed since the last album, not since the first.

I do agree with you that the songs aren't as good. Maybe Erlend used up all his good lyrics on that White Boy shit he's doing.

I don't really care about lyrics, but Erlend's songs are kind of melodically repetitive and "cyclic", a bit like The Smiths at their most melodically annoying, which requires interesting arrangements for them to work at all. Like those 80s synthpop arrangements on that Erlend Øye solo album.

The Smiths at their most melodically annoying

i really liked riot, am looking fwd to this

I'd say the new album sounds more like the first than the second one. (Not that they're greatly different).

Loving the new one although I can understand it won't be for everyone

I really like this

have there been any remixes at all?

these guys always make me calm and a little sad

explain it one more time. when they kill it's a crime. when you kill it is justice.

this is a great reacord imo

wow record

this and Riot are both classic imho

I never got into it. Loved the first two. Covet my Playing Live In A Room 7"s and liked all Erlend's solo / guest spots but somehow never fell for DoD. Maybe one day.

I love the first half of this album but it loses it's personality in the back half.

when we were in berlin last year we went to that karaoke in the park thing + one of the ppl who got up + sung was erlend, he did you can call me al. it was awesome.

That is amazing.

ha, that is cool. never really got into this new one. sounded nice, obviously, but didn't grab me as much as the albums that preceded it. maybe i'll give it another spin.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcSVUa3sZy4

it's time for a new album imho

You'll have to wait at least a full year for that one.

Should I finally get that last album?

yes

The first half of Declaration of Dependence is as high-quality as anything else they've done. It tends to lose me in the second half though it's still nice songs.

maybe its not having to hear it in a coffee shop this year, but it seems like this stuff has all aged really nicely. I didn't give them a chance at the time but really enjoying it as work from home quiet music.

(or hear music like it in a coffee shop anyway)