Frightened Rabbit - The Winter Of Mixed Drinks

This past week, my beloved Frightened Rabbit commemorated the 5 year anniversary of the first pressing of their debut album Sing The Greys by playing it live in full with their original line-up. This is super-awesome, but it took place in Edinburgh at VERY SHORT NOTICE so I couldn't go. Gutted. As my own form of tribute to this wonderful anniversary, I've decided it's time to do a slightly overdue post about their latest album The Winter Of Mixed Drinks. This, the band's third studio album, was released in March of last year and was definitely in my top 5 albums of 2010. At the time, I bought it on CD (as the only places I could find it for on vinyl wanted £15+) but the wonderful Rise came through for me again by having it on vinyl for the crazily cheap price of £7. Since I own both physical formats of the album, I've included the CD in the pictures for comparison. Let's begin.

I love this cover. Absolutely love it. The design's really clean, and the font is superb. They used the same font on (almost all of) the singles from the album too (see a post about them here) and, as you should know by know, I'm a huge sucker for continuity. The CD, as you can see, is just like its tiny little brother. Aww.

As is the case with most releases these days, it's a gatefold affair. No lyric booklet, which is a shame, but they're printed nicely on one of the interior panels. The CD is similarly fold-out, and shares a lot of the artwork of the vinyl release. Again, joyful continuity makes me happy.

Black vinyl again from Frabbit, and another download code from Fat Cat (as more labels should start to do in all of their releases). I really love that the vinyl labels are the same as the CD design, especially as it's a really nice design. Now, the music. I've expressed my love for Frabbit several times before on this blog alone, including several of the songs on this album in the post I linked to earlier. This is just an all-round excellent album. Much more triumphant than the two that came before it but still with the thoughtful, emotional core that defines the band and the sound that is very much their own. I'd tell you more about the record but a few months ago I found a track by track summary of the album with the band's lead singer Scott, which does it far better than I ever could. Go here and enjoy.