February 04, 2005 - We all live with our favorite records, carting them from car to office to home, loading up their playlists on the ol' iPod time and again. We listen backwards and forwards over and over until they have been internalized. They inhabit us. I've always imagined a high-rise apartment building in my soul where Springsteen's Born to Run has a penthouse suite, where the back catalogues of Graham Parker and Joe Jackson are constantly throwing too many loud, violent parties, and where my Phantom of the Opera and My Fair Lady soundtracks have set up a fabulously appointed residence together.

There are albums that live in us, and there are albums we could live in. Cities Are Temples by Via Satellite is one such record—the sounds, the aural landscape, are so vivid and dense that you can envision packing up your things and setting up shop within the notes and melodies of its music. You hear it, and when you respond to it, you don't just want to hear it again—you wish you could be inside of it.

It's a sonic piece, a gently drifting journey you amble along with for forty-five minutes or so. You put the record on, and the songs happen, and your mind does its thing and your body does its thing. Melody lines depart from the speakers and reach your ears, and sometimes they catch, but often they don't. You'll grab onto the tinkle of a bell or the angry rattle of an electric guitar and follow it for a bit, then lose the thread and wander away.

"Songs" are hard to define on this record, and that's a weakness, because it's not really set up as a big sprawling pop symphony; it's clear the band intends for you to find structure within Cities Are Temples. There's a uniformity to the instrumentation and tempo that makes it hard to pick out tunes; it all tends to blur together. It's also not really the most pulse-poundingly exciting album you'll find. Yes, things do pick up in snatches here and there, but they're more like crescendos in the miniscule movements of this overall work, and less like fully formed "rock songs."

It's intriguing, what Via Satellite is trying to do here. When the tumblers fall into place, there's something really beautiful about Cities Are Temples, and when they don't, it's still fascinating to hear them trying. It's one of those albums you may not be driven to pop into the CD player constantly, but you will miss it and want it, and so you will return. It seems a near-ideal soundtrack for getting high, or making out, or calmly relaxing on the couch with a bottle of wine and a good book. If you're into that sort of thing.

To say it's "recommended" is perhaps too strong a word. You'll probably know from reading this if it's up your alley. You'll probably buy it. You should like it. If not, just evict its sorry ass from the musical apartment complex of your mind.

Definitely Download:
1. "Sunrise"
2. "Close As I Can"
3. "Already Gone"

Overall Score 7.8