Best Snow Patrol Songs & Videos
10 Best Snow Patrol Songs and Videos
Snow Patrol are a British band who have been hugely popular for the last decade. They have recorded 6 albums, their most recent one 'Fallen Empires' is due for release on November 14th.
With the new album, the band have promised a move in a new direction but they will continue to have the melodic and lyrical talents of Gary Lightbody (their lead vocalist) at the forefront.
So here are my top 10 Snow Patrol songs with accompanying videos. Feel free to vote on your favourites in the poll at the end or let me know what they are in the comments - I'm happy to be swayed if you make a good case for your choice being there.
Enjoy.......
Gary Lightbody is the lead vocalist and lyricist of Snow Patrol. I am a big fan of good lyrics and I think he is, arguably, one of the best lyricists in rock today. His songs are usually about love - falling in and out of it but he is such an honest writer. Sometimes I hear his songs and my heart aches.
In some songs, for example 'Chocolate' he sings about his own weaknesses - it's a song written for his girlfriend and is his admission of his own infidelity and imperfections - 'just cos I'm sorry doesn't mean, I didn't enjoy it at the time."
Then think of 'You Could Be Happy' - he is nostalgic for love lost, its nuances, its memories, its happiness and sadness - 'now everything I own smells of you, and for the tiniest moment, it's all not true."
This first video is an animated production by someone and it is sad and wonderful.
1. You Could Be Happy
I envy and admire the person who made this video - an animated tale of a boy remembering and missing his girl but trying to wish her well for the future. There are other videos on YouTube by the same person who made this.
I've included this unofficial version because it is very touching and poignant.
I hope you enjoy it.
2. Run
'Run' was one of Snow Patrol's earliest trans-Atlantic hits and it was hugely popular in the UK.
The song was covered with great success by X-Factor winner Leoni Lewis.
Most cover versions don't stand up to the original but Lewis does an amazing job - a very pared down version with emotion and soul.
3. Chocolate
'Chocolate' was released on the back of the success of 'Run' and some critics felt that Snow Patrol had sold out after 'Songs For Polarbears' and went for a more commercial sound.
I don't necessarily agree with this view.
Even the songs on the first album have stood the test of time because Lightbody is the master of good melody and good melodies = usually remembered after you've hear them = HIT!
4. Set The Fire To The Third Bar (with Martha Wainwright)
This song was recorded as a duet with Martha Wainwright.
Wainwright has a very raw, folky voice which really complements Gary Lightbody's.
Snow Patrol did the duet with Cheryl Cole at the Royal Command Performance in 2010 and in spite of some nay-sayers saying she would blow it, she was actually really good.
5. Chasing Cars
"If I lay here,
If I just lay here,
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world."
Magic! "Yes Gary, I would."
6. The Planets Bend Between Us
The single version of this is slightly different to the album version; I actually prefer the album version but hey-ho.
Lightbody's song to his lover across the Atlantic is just a perfect piece of love poety,
I will race you to the waterside,
And from the edge of Ireland shout out loud
So they could hear me in America
"It's all for you."
7. Make This Go On Forever
This is an inclusion of an unofficial video. There are, as you may be aware, thousands of unofficial videos which members of the public make themselves - melding their favourite films or TV clips to their favourite pieces of music. I think this is a wonderful idea and I do like to play around with these kinds of this things in my spare time.
This is a really good video to Mulder and Scully from the X Files.
8. Spitting Games
"I broke into your house last night...." sings Gary Lightbody but this song is not a tale of criminality.
It's the story of a boy wanting to tell a girl he loves her but deciding on a strange way to do it.
Snow Patrol's song words are usually written ling after the melody and music and this song's words are fun but it's all about the melody and a great falsetto melody line which you remember long after the song has ended.
9. Open Your Eyes
The video for open your eyes is from a clip in the film 'C'etait un Rendezvous' where some person is driving around Paris in a Ferrari.
It's very effective when set to this piece of music.
10. Signal Fire
Signal Fire was featured in the film 'Spider Man 3'
It was the only single released from the soundtrack.
'A Hundred Million Suns' was an incredibly successful album and Spider Man 3 probably helped its sales.
My choices all come from Snow Patrol's last 4 albums but I could just have happliy picked one or two of their earlier songs.
Gary Lightbody wrote 'An Olive Grove Facing The Sea' and 'Give Me Strength' as a younger man but both are lyrically good and also more acoustic than Snow Patrol's later productions.
Their latest single 'Called Out In The Dark' marks a change of pace for Snow Patrol; the song will be a hit, it's very, very catchy.
The new album has a slight change of pace but by and large, is classic Snow Patrol, great music, great lyrics - how can they fail?
Now over to you....