Track 4: City Lights - The Waeve

And the machine gun words you say drop in my mind like bombs...

City Lights is a big, booming song about people who still get excited about whatever mysteries and excitement exist in the alleys and corners of a sprawling city. It feels like a natural progression from Against the Night, which set the stakes. The stakes are deepened here, as Graham Coxon lays down a post-punk guitar line warning us of the dangers that lurk in the dark, and kicks the verse off singing

Now your soul belongs to me /
It'll be alright /
Out in the darkness, free to fly /
We'll get some sleep tomorrow

Doesn’t exactly sound like it’s gonna be all right, Graham! But that’s okay. I get it. I get the allure of going out and throwing caution to the wind.

City Lights is the title track to the Waeve’s second album in two years, and before you ask, it’s pronounced Weave. Why stylize it like that? Probably the same reason ChVrches is spelled like that - Google searches.

Coxon plays guitar and saxophone on the song sounding far more invested then anything he’s done with Blur since before he first left the band, and I love this creative side of him going for broke, mixing styles, sick guitar solos and wailing sax that sounds like it could be ripped from an old episode of Miami Vice. I also love the backup vocals from Rose Elinor Dougall (formerly of the Pipettes - and Coxon’s current love interest). Occasionally I think about the brief period of time when The Pipettes had a lot of buzz, and damn, it, I’ll die on this hill - the first Pipettes album was a banger. Here’s Dougall singing lead on Dirty Mind.

Here’s the status of the mix. Four songs in - how’s it sounding so far?

Click here for the Infinite Mixtape on Spotify.
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