Fluxblog
April 25th, 2018 1:30am

You Almost Apologized


Sloan “Don’t Stop (If It Feels Good, Do It)”

Sloan is a band comprised of four singer-songwriters with their own distinct but complementary aesthetics. It took me a long time to notice this, but one of the ways their styles overlap is in how each of them writes lyrics. By and large, their songs tend to be addressing someone – their relationship with that person is usually left ambiguous – and the tone is usually critical, though seldom confrontational. They always sound like they’re negotiating for peace, making a case for cutting someone off, or talking someone into something. In the context of the albums it often sounds like they might be passive-aggressively singing to each other. I wouldn’t be shocked if a significant chunk of the Sloan catalog is about the interpersonal dynamics of the band.

“Don’t Stop (If It Feels Good Do It)” is a Chris Murphy composition, but its title and hook is a callback to a Patrick Pentland song from their 2001 record Pretty Together. I’m not sure how significant that connection is, but it doesn’t seem like a coincidence. At any rate, this song slots right into my Grand Unifying Theory of Sloan – the verses are all Murphy chiding some overbearing person with a poor sense of boundaries, but the chorus is just good time rock vibes that defuse the mood. It’s a very fun song, so it’s hard to tell how seriously you’re supposed to take the negative lyrics. Murphy never seems particularly angry. If anything, he seems bemused.

Buy it from Bandcamp.

RSS Feed for this postNo Responses.


©2008 Fluxblog
Site by Ryan Catbird