Right. So, Lillestrøm. Norway. Land of… well, apparently, intensely yearning folk-rock anthems now. Thomas And The Angry Hearts, shepherded into existence by Ronni Le Tekrø (of TNT fame, remember explosions?), have dropped “It’s You,” and the title isn’t kidding. The whole thing is an extended, sometimes dizzying, ode to someone.
This isn’t a casual, “hey, you’re nice” kind of thing. This is full-blown, operatic (in a 70s folk-rock way, mind you, think Hooters but add a dash of… I don’t know… a Viking longship?). The lyrics, fronted by Thomas, naturally. Then we’ve got Hilde, Stig, Nils, and Leiv-Rune along for the ride, speak of sailing oceans and walking with royalty. Big dreams, classic stuff. All fueled it seems by a burning quest to share and experince, to find, well…you.
And who is this “you”? A lover? A muse? A forgotten chess piece found under the sofa cushion of life? The album doesn’t offer a definitive answer, keeping this mysterious ‘you’ is central to this album’s draw.
But here’s the kicker, tucked within the layers of soaring, U2-esque guitar lines and a sound that wouldn’t be out of place in 1992 (and I mean that in a good way!), there’s an element that feels very raw. Lines like “how will we make amends, try to send your child away” adds, an unexected shade to the whole experience.
It’s this constant push-pull between grand ambition – the singalongs, the imagined crowds, the sheer scale of it all – and this raw, almost desperate plea hidden, embedded, stitched into the heart of this quest, it is both grand and a whisper.
There is an unfulfilled yearning with, and for “you”, and this gives “It’s You” a haunting, almost paradoxical quality. Thomas and the Angy hearts, are angry about somthing, is it because of ‘You’?
Are we all just searching for our own “you?”
