American Football [LP 2]

In 2014, the members of American Football reunited to play a series of shows around the world to all the people who had been touched so deeply by their album originally and over the many years since its release. It went so well that the band (the original trio of Mike Kinsella, Steve Holmes, and Steve Lamos plus Mike's brother Nate on bass) decided to return to the studio and make an album, which they again titled American Football. The first questions that come to mind before even spinning the record are something like: Have the years changed the band much? Did they embrace electronics or go acoustic or buy a bunch of fuzz pedals? The answers come during the first notes of the opening song, "Where Are We Now?" The band sounds pretty much like it did in the late '90s. The same crystalline guitar tones, the same interlocking arpeggios, the same kind of shifting time signatures, and the same plaintive vocals are all in place and continue throughout the entire album.

1    Where Are We Now?
2    My Instincts Are the Enemy
3    Home Is Where the Haunt Is
4    Born to Lose
5    I've Been So Lost for So Long
6    Give Me the Gun
7    I Need a Drink (Or Two Or Three)
8    Desire Gets in the Way
9    Everyone Is Dressed Up