Visiting Milliontown via Kings Cross St. Pancras

[SerFox]

So here I am after dying my hair a dreamy blue colour in an attempt to alure tourists to notice me performing in the Edinburgh Fringe and empty their wallets, and I decide to catch the next tube to Milliontown and reexperience it.

I haven't listened to this album all the way through since EIMA. I'm not sure why but I think I got the same feeling as Jem. In the run up to EIMA I had to listen to Milliontown once a night if not more, and would feel weird if I hadn't heard it. Then when EIMA arrived at my door, carrying it carefully to my desk, smiling at the signatures, Milliontown sat gathering dust.

EIMA felt so different, really... more than a different band, it felt like a new genre. It did not conform to any rules of prog what so ever, yet it didnt seem so sporadic as other bands attempts. When a band tries to do something in a genre but not follow the rules it ends up sounding too experimental and often samey, and by that, practically unlistenable.

EIMA felt like a new coffee table. Well crafted, practical, thoughtful design and polished. Milliontown seemed like the old collection of tables you put together in the garage. Seemed a good idea at the time but ended up being infinitly complicated and slightly awkward, but it was still loved and cared for.

Going back to Milliontown feels so strange. I'm not too sure what I'm listening to. I am in no way, to quoth Jem 'shitcanning the album', but I feel like I'm listening to a cover compilation of songs done by the band covering them. Prog rock synthfest followed by an anthem, then a pop song followed by a metal song composed by kraftwerk's cousin. BLM and the title track are still sublime to me, but the whole thing lacks the sheen that EIMA has. I can't put my finger on it, maybe the way things got recorded, maybe some fancy compressor doodah...


Now I want you to go listen back to Milliontown. How does it make you feel? Is it still Frost*? Is it the Frost* you fell in love with? If so, then who is EIMA?

[catherine]

I listen to Milliontown and EIMA about equally at the moment. The first time I went back to Milliontown after EIMA it felt a little - loud, perhaps - but it still sounds pretty fresh and crunchy to my jaded old ears, even though it's comfortably and reassuringly familiar now.

Milliontown was the first Frost* I heard, so it will always have a special place as the Frost* I first fell in love with.

EIMA, on the other hand, has a mixture of slickness and polish and mannered genteel restraint that the unbridled Milliontown doesn't. In the title track, at about 1.30, it feels like it really badly wants to burst into a screaming chorus, but it doesn't; it has another calm and measured verse instead and makes you wait another minute until it does so. The tension is nearly unbearable.  

If Milliontown was a person, it would be Russell Brand.

If EIMA was a person, it would be Stephen Fry.

[gr8gonzo]

A few days ago, I listened to Milliontown for the first time in a long while.  It was a pleasant revisiting and had regained some of what had become lost through incessant listening.  Still wondreful.

[rogerg]

while I love both albums, Milliontown the album is more of what I want in music that EIMA.  Milliontown the song blows me away.  every single time.  epic.  I get filled with joy and elation, and feel that, for a time at least, that all is right with the world.

[LivingForever]

while I love both albums, Milliontown the album is more of what I want in music that EIMA.  Milliontown the song blows me away.  every single time.  epic.  I get filled with joy and elation, and feel that, for a time at least, that all is right with the world.

Absolutely agreed.

EIMA is a great album which I enjoy a lot.

Milliontown makes me feel joyful and elated from beginning to end, pretty much like nothing else I own.

[Mouse]

I listen to both Experiments and Milliontown regularly and I still can't compare the two. They both sound very different from each other, but to me they sound like both sides of the same coin. And that coin is one f*cking brilliant coin!  

[namister]

They are 2 different albums for me and have different memories for both.  Milliontown is like its a classic, warm, black and white movie in 2D, and EIMA is like a colour epic all 3D.  If you listen to both one after the other its like watching Wizard of Oz when they move into colour from black and white.

[Gandalf1986]

I listen to both Experiments and Milliontown regularly and I still can't compare the two. They both sound very different from each other, but to me they sound like both sides of the same coin. And that coin is one f*cking brilliant coin!  

That's exactly what I think about the two wonders that Frost* made!