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Tegan and Sara: Don’t Rush mp3 (click)

Amanda Palmer recently called the new Tegan and Sara album Sainthood a “grower”, and I’m never one to disagree with AFP, but Sainthood grabbed me immediately.

Ok, no immediately, but from the first time I heard “Don’t Rush”-the second song on the record. What appears at first shine to be a standard poppy love song with a harder edge is actually the sort of raw and wry half-plea/half-kissoff (basically an “I fucked up, and I’ll cover it up, wait don’t run away” song) that Bono perfected so well on Achtung, Baby. In fact, the entire album is like that-even though the production’s up to the caliber of some of the most polished moments on The Con, the emotions here run red and deep and raw and hurt. The lyrics run themselves in confused circles that mask hurt and anger with faux-sincerity until eventually the whole thing drops and you feel what’s been lost. This is an ideal winter-weather post-breakup record even though musically it’s the loudest thing T&S have ever done. The full plug-in can’t compete with the sound of bitten tongues firmly planeted in cheeks, and that’s what’s going to make Sainthood an album I return to again and again over the next few months.