I run the risk of alienating a few folk here, so I’ll whisper it. I don’t quite get all the hoo-ha over Chvrches.
In saying that, I’m pleased that a Scottish act, particularly one featuring an ex-member of the hugely underrated and largely unappreciated The Unwinding Hours and Aereogramme, is being so critically acclaimed and selling decent amounts of records, but the synthpop music they make just doesn’t move me. Probably an age thing…..but the vocals in particular often make them far closer to the clean, near antiseptic pop fodder that makes up much of the modern era chart stuff than it is to the pioneering stuff from the late 70s and early-mid 80s with which they are often compared.
Here’s one that I don’t mind too much from their debut LP The Bones Of What You Believe, released back in 2013:-
mp3 : Chvrches – Lies
Enjoy.
THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN 
Welcome to the club JC…I wish I could find a way of liking Chvrches. I just don’t get anything from them. I know that Iain Cook has some amazing music in him and his collaborations with Simple Minds have created some of the band’s most potent music for the passed 25 years. But Chvrches always sound in some way compromised, not fully realized.
Got your back on this one, buddy. I shouldn’t have to work so hard to like them.
They sound as dull and uninspiring as so many insipid electro-pop bands around these days. Yes, in the late 70s/early 80s it was fresh. Most of today’s crop are merely derivative with barely a decent tune between them.
Yeasayer is an example of an electro-pop band that gets it right much of the time, but your Chvrches, Polica, and all the other soundalikes – nah. Not for me.
I’m with you guys
Got the first album following the hype
It’s alright is the best I can come up with
Don’t play it that often
I try to wait until I’ve seen a band live before I form a solid opinion. I saw Chvrches a couple of years back at Coachella and can say from first hand experience that the most interesting thing about them is they spell Churches with a V.
Just to go against the current run of play on here – I love “The Mother We Share” …and have enjoyed a few other tracks I’ve heard live from Glastonbury performances on TV
#controversial 😉
i fucking hate chvrches
i fucking love chvrches
I will join the chorus of CHVRCHES naysayers. They played in town and when sampling their wares on iTunes, found their vocalist indigestible. Completely naff. She obviously thinks she’s in the wrong band. The music is at best a pleasant pastiche of former glories we lived through better the first time. It takes a lot to make me pass up a Scot synthpop band who actually played locally!! They must be doing something wrong. Actually, I find synthpop boring. There! I said it!
Echorich is correct to point out that the material Cook write with Simple Minds was decidedly strong. I’ll bet that Jim Kerr pinches himself weekly knowing he met Cook when he was a nobody and managed to wring 4-5 tunes that he will surely milk for at least 15 years of stately Simple Minds releases. Mentioning Cook’s name duly in the press each go round of promo. Meanwhile, Cook has had no thought of nor contact with Kerr since that period in Kerr’s parent’s kitchen when they hammered out the songs prior to starting up his band, which apparently had hits even in America.