Neil Hannon's tenth full-length album under the Divine Comedy banner finds the jovial tunesmith expounding on the elegant, aristocratic chamber pop that has become his forte since the project’s inception over two decades ago.
The lighter, more orchestral tone that began with 2004’s glorious Absent Friends is in full effect on Bang Goes the Knighthood, a breezy 12-song concoction of witticisms and laments populated with the usual assortment of hopeless romantics, ballers, and gadflys and clueless upper-class youth.
Hannon’s fetish for Scott Walker/Burt Bacharach/Oscar Wilde-isms comes full circle on the theatrical opener, “Down in the Streets Below”; the jaunty “Neapolitan Girl” skips effortlessly through the city on a foundation of Serge Gainsbourg strings; and “The Lost Art of Conversation” celebrates the great orators of politics, philosophy, and literature with one of the more effortless piano-driven Beatlesque melodies that the artist has crafted to date.
Not very powerful stuff, but Hannon's built a career on being the tipsy and outgoing though secretly lonesome partygoer on the veranda with the best jokes, and while the whole affair can feel a bit slight, it’s certainly never dull.
Cheers.
| Title/Composers | Performer | Listen | Time | Size | Size | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Down in the Street BelowNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 05:09 | 11 MB | 30 MB |
| 2 | The Complete BankerNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 03:43 | 8 MB | 22 MB |
| 3 | Bang Goes the KnighthoodNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 02:48 | 6 MB | 15 MB |
| 4 | At the Indie DiscoNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 03:18 | 7 MB | 19 MB |
| 5 | Have You Ever Been In LoveNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 03:10 | 7 MB | 20 MB |
| 6 | Assume the PerpendicularNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 04:06 | 9 MB | 27 MB |
| 7 | The Lost Art of ConversationNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 04:01 | 9 MB | 27 MB |
| 8 | Island LifeNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 04:38 | 10 MB | 30 MB |
| 9 | When a Man CriesNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 03:54 | 8 MB | 21 MB |
| 10 | Can You Stand Upon One LegNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 03:32 | 8 MB | 20 MB |
| 11 | I LikeNeil Hannon | The Divine Comedy | Play | 03:48 | 8 MB | 27 MB |
| 12 | Neapolitan Gir | The Divine Comedy | Play | 02:49 | 6 MB | 19 MB |
| 45 mins | 103 MB | |||||
| 45 mins | 284 MB | |||||
| Artist | Job | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Divine Comedy | Primary Artist |
| 2 | Neil Hannon | Composer, Producer |
| Quality | Format | Encoding | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard | MP3 | 320kps 44.1kHz | MP3 is an audio coding format which uses a form of lossy data compression. The highest bitrate of this format is 320kbps (kbit/s). MP3 Digital audio takes less amount of space (up to 90% reduction in size) and the quality is not as good as the original one. |
| CD Quality | FLAC | 16bit 44.1kHz | FLAC is an audio coding format which uses lossless compression. Digital audio in FLAC format has a smaller size and retains the same quality of the original Compact Disc (CD). |