Music Love: "Alleyway" by Life in Film

If you stick with this series long enough, you’ll see me talk about lyrics a lot. I prefer great lyrics and a fine voice to the actual music itself. My husband thinks I’m weird. To him, the music and the beat are paramount. He doesn’t really care if the lyrics are dumb. Perhaps this is why we have very different taste in music, not that I mind. To each their own, right?

A large part of what I like about the UK’s Life in Film is their lyrics. I came to “Alleyway” because of Sirius XM, which we got for free for a year when we leased our car. There were about five channels I listened to regularly, one of which was the alternative station. That’s where I first heard Life in Film’s catchy, upbeat single “Get Closer.” I downloaded it immediately. A few months later, I looked to see if they had anything else available and discovered their songs “Alleyway,” and “It’s What Happens Next That Matters Most.” I downloaded those as well, and pre-ordered the rest of the album.

It was a first for me. I’m not the type to pay for an album before listening to it. Heck, I’m not really the type to download a whole album at all. I usually just cherry pick the songs that I like. So that should tell you how much I love Life in Film.

In addition to their lyrics (in this song: “And what we have, no one ever gives up lightly. What time is it when the whole world stops?” and “And so we’ll break our wrists, trying to hold up the world for a few more seconds so we won’t be lonely for a while”), I also love lead singer Samuel Fry’s rich, strong vocals. His tone has a hint of a wail to it that I feel like I shouldn’t enjoy but do. I also like the uptempo beat of most of their music. In particular, I’m a sucker for uptempo songs that are actually sad, such as this one, the tale former lovers meeting and discovering, all over again, that they don’t belong together.

There’s currently no “official” video for “Alleyway.” I had to choose between linking a video with a still photo and the studio version of the song or a video with the band playing an acoustic version of it. Honestly, it was a tough choice. One of my favorite things about this song is the guitar intro, which I find rather haunting. It loses that quality in the acoustic version, but that’s the one I chose anyway because I thought my readers might like to see what the band looks like. Also, I’m impressed that Samuel Fry’s voice seems as strong outside of the studio as it is in it. 

However, I encourage you to listen to the studio version of the song. I also encourage you to buy as much of Life in Film’s music you can find because they're a band that's going places.