VCV: Copeland – “Control Freak”

Many of you will remember 2006 as the year I just would not shut the fuck up about Guster and their brilliant Ganging Up On The Sun.  That's certainly how I remember it and I promise when their new album drops you can count on more of the same (crossing my fingers for 2010, guys!).  Until then, I've gone back to the future to find a band who can help me with my Guster fix.

One of the joys of my job is that I'm often passed along free copies of upcoming and recently released CDs for my consideration.  One of the pissers of my job is that I still need a day job and I don't have the time to listen to everything that comes my way.  Sometimes it takes weeks, months, and in this case years for me to dig something up and give it the listen it deserves.

At some point, somebody sent me a copy of Copeland's Eat, Sleep, Repeat.  I have no idea who and I don't know when but the album was released in 2006 so I think we know who to blame for me not getting to it until a couple weeks ago.  So who do we credit for me picking the album up and listening?  Jon Foreman of Switchfoot and Fiction Family.  I was watching Switchfoot's Ventura DVD when right before the band went into a brilliant performance of one of my favorite songs he declared his undying love for a band called Copeland.  A few weeks ago I was digging through a stack of CDs looking for one thing and finding ESR instead.

It was difficult choosing which song to write about to declare my own undying love of Copeland because the opening sequence of ESR is wonderfully sequenced and seamlessly executed.  What's also clear is that I would have loved this album in 2006 because a big part of what fired my obsession with Guster is present here: melodies.  "Control Freak" is just one of those gooey melodies and it's accompanied by some clever word play.  Frontman Aaron Marsh is a melodic savant and if I were an A&R guy or some record company executive, I would promise to release Copeland records until the end of time if he would sit down and write hooks for some of my pop acts because this guy has a hit in him.  Copeland will never get that kind of exposure but Marsh could be a song doctor in his spare time and fund his band and pay the mortgage when that inevitable hit happens.

So to those of you who have ever sent me a CD hoping one day I might write about your client, my message is patience.  If I live long enough, I'll write about everything.  In the meantime, I've found the second most melodic album of 2006 to keep me company while I wait for a follow up to the gold medal winner.