Rock of Ages: Arcade Fire - "Crown of Love" (2004)

It's hard to deny the near perfection of Arcade Fire's 2004 album Funeral. It is easily the best thing that has been released in the new millennium. Poignant and heartbreaking and filled with intense orchestrations, it's a dauntingly enjoyable listen to enjoy. It is chock full of perfect songs, but the one that is near and dear to me is "Crown of Love." A beautiful mourning ballad of loss, as many of the songs on Funeral are, the track sways with melancholy strings and heartfelt vocals. Just like our entry from the eternal Jeff Buckley, "Crown of Love" is about love lost, but how sometimes that love that got away is still the greatest love of all. It's lyrics are superb and this is my personal favorite passage from the track:

"They say it fades if you let it,
love was made to forget it.
I carved your name across my eyelids,
you pray for rain I pray for blindness."

Arcade Fire paint a gorgeous picture of love and loss on Funeral and "Crown of Love" is the high point of those feelings. The end of the main set of lyrics swells and turns into the most harrowing disco-beat I've ever heard before coming to a slow fade-out. It's the kind of excitement that brings a tear to your eye in it's beauty. The strings swell, the piano pounds along with the sadness of the lyrics and the idea of lost love on such a grand scale is so affecting sometimes. No one ever said heartbreak was easy, but Arcade Fire make it fitfully brilliant and engaging at the same time.



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