Album Review: Big Monster Love – Game Over

Big Monster Love – Game Over

When I was just a little lad I used to go to school, I’d sit down there in the seat, feeling like a fool, the teacher taught us everything, everything we know… I had these great visions for the future, all these plans about what I’d do when I had a house of my own. Myself and my best friend at the time did everything together. We had this glorious notion that we’d build houses beside each other, that our wives would be best friends, and we’d spend the evenings playing video games. There would be one of those model trains that went through every room in the house, maybe even be able to bring biscuits and a glass of coke from the kitchen to the sitting room, without having to get out of our chair.

I didn’t have aspirations of being a world famous soccer player or anything. Just a regular job with regular hours, but plenty of money to allow myself to buy whatever fantastic video game console Sega would have out, and to buy it and a few games on the day it was released. I think every kid has great dreams like that. Like when Preston Waters becomes Mister Macintosh in Blank Check.

Real life isn’t like that. You grow up. You realise it’s actually not like that. Some of the things come true. But about 5% of them. You may find yourself a gorgeous girlfriend or boyfriend, and actually have a decent job, but do you even talk to that best mate from when you were 5? Maybe on facebook, on his birthday.

Game Over from Big Monster Love is if those broken dreams became an album. “I wanna build a waterslide 14,000 feet high in my back yard / But it contravenes the planning laws”. Reality always catches up with you. Adult life isn’t what you expected, “it’s really not the same”. But it can still be fun. It’s not all “mortgage repayments”. Sometimes it is fun. It’s not just one massive anti-climax. Sometimes small things can cheer you up, like when you receive/download an album that reminds you of simpler times “in your Guns ‘N’ Roses t-shirt” with its fantastically clever lyrics “she has the illness that I never heard of, before” and exquisite jangly pop melodies.

This is what pop music is all about. Not cheesy radio filler, but charming and entertaining lines over a catchy, memorable tune. Big Monster Love has a knack for rhyme and wordplay that puts him above almost every other songwriter out there. “You’re a rare one, my friend.”

Rating:  

Related posts:

1. Album News: Big Monster Love – Game Over
2. Live: Big Monster Love for Popicalia #6
3. Album Review: Airwave Atlantic – Game Play EP
4. Album Review: No Monster Club – Young Guts Champion
5. Album Review: Preachers Son – Love, Life & Limb

Tags bandcamp Big Monster Love Dublin Ireland Irish Pop