Singles

Iron & Wine - Such Great Heights

Mike Mantin 08/08/2006

Rating: 2/5

Eerily mimicking the success of Jose Gonzales' 'Heartbeats', Iron & Wine's 'new' (it's three years old) single reworks a track from The Postal Service, the indietronica side-project of Dntel electro-whizz Jimmy Tamborello and Death Cab For Cutie frontman Ben Gibbard. Fueled by its inclusion on an Ask.com advert, its release as a single seems rather pointless. The original, which after three years remains an almost permanent fixture in the Last.fm charts, was made wonderful by the juxtaposition of Tamborello's computerised soundscape with Gibbard's wide-eyed romanticism. Lines like "I am thinking it's a sign that the freckles in our eyes are mirror images/And when we kiss they're perfectly aligned", when stripped of those bleeps, just sound like the saccharine musings of any old singer-songwriter.

Tucked away as an extra on the original 'Such Great Heights' single, Iron And Wine's version started life as an interesting treat for fans but, much like Gonzales' Knife cover, it works best as a comparison piece, an interesting come-down after the electronic rush of the original, and it is incredibly irritating for fans of both that advertising has got in the way of both. Iron & Wine and The Postal Service both have back catalogues of beautiful, affecting music waiting to be discovered, it's just a shame a search engine may make a sketchy experiment may be people's first contact with either. And Ask.com is trounced by Google anyway.