The Frames: For The Birds : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

"I'm not mad, I'm just disappointed," sings Frames frontman Glen Hansard as his band's fourth album winds toward a close. The words could easily describe the Dublin, Ireland outfit's history, a decade-long chronicle of label woes and records that were just short of what they could've been. But they've come out on the other side better for it. Co-produced by Steve Albini, For the Birds is a literate, delicate and passionate record that sways with the sort of majestic weariness embedded in the Dirty Three's best work. It's a far cry from the Pixies-inflected rock the band was playing ten years ago, but their evolution has been gradual and organic. Typical of the results is "What Happens When the Heart Just Stops," which opens as a whisper but gradually works itself to a fever pitch, as a transcendent mess of horns, guitars and strings embolden Hansard's cries of the album's apparent mantra, "I'm disappointed." He shouldn't be.

DAVID PEISNER
(November 19, 2001)