WE BECAME YOUR FAMILY WHEN YOU DIED

Bullets In Madison are a post-rock group from the Chicago area, the birthplace of post-rock. Unlike the more instrumental bands from that area, BIM have more in common with the more vocal oriented groups like Sigur Ros. The title of this, their first album, is typical post-rock. The music is very uplifting and melodic for the most part. The sound and production is good.

I like the part in "Impossible Grave" with the handclaps when the vocals come in. "Joel Found His Angel Cowering In The Garden" begins with some spoken word. Drums come in later and then it's instrumental. "Riots" sounds like a cross betwwen Radiohead and U2, which can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on your tastes. "St. Jude" has cool drum machine programming. Nice vocals in this song as well. "Crimes" has some neat glockenspiel(?) and some good drumming at the end.

Overall, this is a good modern rock album, but nothing very challenging or original. Sometimes it sounds like a more progressive Arcade Fire. Recommended to those who like modern vocal oriented post-rock. I thought the playing and sound in general was very well done, but nothing about the compositions themselves were very memorable. A decent effort nonetheless. 3 stars.