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El President

Their first, self-titled album came out in 1995.  I picked it up a few years later at a used CD shop on Mont-Royal and its depressing lyrics suited the sullen mood that defined my last year of high school perfectly.  So much so, that Drugstore—and that album in particular—became unlistenable in the years that followed.  The music was too tied up in a particular time; it didn’t bring up warm feelings of nostalgia, but rather a kind of acute and uncomfortable nausea.

It’s funny how certain connotations or feelings can become less pronounced over time.  I put Drugstore’s first and second albums on my iPod this week on a whim.  I actually wasn’t surprised when, upon listening to them, those old feelings did not emerge at all.  As I have realized so many times in choosing songs to post and in exploring the reasons they affect me—I am not the person I was then.

I quite like the sweetness of Isabel Monteiro's voice—the contrast between it and the words she sings.  “El President” doesn’t characterize Drugstore’s music, exactly (especially with those touches of…what is it?...Spanish guitar?), but hearing Monteiro’s voice paired with Thom Yorke’s still manages to make the hairs on my arms stand on end.