Mine is Yours

Who: Cold War Kids
What: Mine is Yours
When: January 2011

Mine is Yours is pleasantly surprising, every single song says “I’m perfect for mass singalongs, play me to a large festival audience” without being pointlessly overblown. The fact that they’ve retained some real subtlety and heart in this album is part of the reason I love it so. It’s absolutely not what I expected at all. It’s got; I guess the only word is, bigger production, jangly, bright guitar lines, and huge, singable choruses.

This is a hell of an album; my heart may just burst from all the goodness coming out of this. A lot of the songs have a real, bluesy, R&B type feel that is hitting every pleasure centre in my brain, Royal Blue, in particular is a great example of how they use this. They go further into that world with Sensitive Kid, which almost feels like a hip hop beat, and the understated piano line complements it well. Lyrically, as well, there seems to be a level of literacy and willingness to play with words that is up with, if not better than what has come before. Cold Toes on the Cold Floor, though, has a slightly more menacing energy that is much more like the Cold War Kids I remember, slinky bass, and powerful vocals, with guitar to match make it feel meatier, juicier than the rest.

The album wears it’s heart on its sleeve, and adorably so. Title track, Mine Is Yours is a gorgeous love song, Broken Open and Skip the Charade are endearingly saccharine, and Finally Open, with lines like “Finally I let you inside/Finally made it past the end/to finally begin” is so touching, you can bet Simon Cowell is lining up a cover by some terrible pop starlet who’ll ruin it with overwrought emotion as we speak.           

I really am so blown away by this, uplifting and uncomplicated; it’s a great way to spend some time. So Cold War Kids have made an album full of gorgeous, sunny pop songs. Wind down the windows and break out the sunscreen. You’ll be playing this all summer (and autumn, winter and spring) long.