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1->''"I cannot emphasize enough that my body is a badly designed, poorly put together vessel''
2->''harbouring these diminishing, so-called "vital" organs''
3->''hope my heart goes first''
4->''I HOPE MY HEART GOES FIRST!"''
5-->--'''Los Campesinos!,''' ''"We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed"''
6
7Los Campesinos! are an indie pop band from Cardiff, UsefulNotes/{{Wales}} (although most of their members are from England).
8
9The band is a seven-piece, all of whom have adopted the [[ThemeNaming shared last name "Campesinos"]]: Gareth (vocals, lyrics), Tom (guitar), Neil (guitar), Kim (vocals, keyboards), Rob (various instruments), Matt (bass) and Jason (drums). The band initially included singer/keyboardist Aleksandra, but she left the band amicably in 2009 and was replaced by Gareth's sister Kim. Original drummer Ollie left in early 2010 and was replaced by Jason, the band's tour manager and - to an extent, [[TheSixthRanger Rob]] (who had been touring with the band as an additional musician for about a year). A third original band member, violinist and keyboardist Harriet, left the band in September 2011 to continue her studies. A fourth, bassist Ellen, left the band in December 2012 to focus on her writing career, among other projects; The band waited until 2014 to introduce Matt, her replacement.
10
11Although the band received considerable buzz and attention for their 2007 single "You! Me! Dancing!", they never quite found another mainstream breakthrough moment. They have, however, retained an intensely devoted cult following and their critical acclaim, with all six of their albums receiving solid reviews. Over the course of their career, they have moved from their early twee-pop sound to a noisier, indie rock sound that puts an emphasis on their tight musicianship and lead singer Gareth's wry, darkly humorous and self-effacing lyrics.
12
13!!Discography
14
15Studio albums:
16* ''Hold On Now, Youngster...'' (2008)
17* ''We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed'' (2008)
18* ''Romance is Boring'' (2010)
19* ''Hello Sadness'' (2011)
20* ''No Blues'' (2013)
21* ''Sick Scenes'' (2017)
22
23Other releases:
24* ''Sticking Fingers into Sockets'' EP (2007)
25* ''All's Well That Ends'' EP (2010)
26* ''A Good Night for a Fist Fight'' live album (2013)
27* ''A Los Campesinos! Christmas'' EP (2014)
28* ''Whole Damn Body'' rarities compilation (2021)
29
30!!Los Campesinos! provides examples of these tropes!
31* AlbumTitleDrop: ''We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed'', ''Romance Is Boring'' and ''Hello Sadness'' all feature one within each album's [[TitleTrack title track]]. ''A Good Night For A Fist Fight's'' album title comes from the song "By Your Hand," ''No Blues''' comes from the song "As Lucerne/The Low," and ''Sick Scenes'' comes from the song "Here's to the Fourth Time!" The ''All's Well That Ends'' EP has one from a bonus verse in an updated version of "In Medias Res" (which was listed in the lyrics of the ''Romance is Boring'' version, but is drowned out by distortion and instrumentation).
32* AlmightyJanitor: Gareth, for a time, worked as a part-time groundskeeper of a local church's cemetery when the band wasn't touring, a job which he told Pitchfork makes him "[[http://pitchfork.com/features/interviews/8753-los-campesinos/ incredibly happy]]" to do.
33* AnimatedMusicVideo: Both of the videos for "We Throw Parties, You Throw Knives" and "You! Me! Dancing!" are animated with the same general animation style and seem to share the same continuity, with the ending shot of the former being the starting shot for the latter.
34* AntiLoveSong: A good number of their songs revolve around relationships, but either they [[BreakupSong end poorly]] or are accompanied with mediocrity or even [[DestructiveRomance flat-out vitriol]]. One of their best examples is "Romance is Boring":
35--> ''We are two ships that pass in the night!''\
36''You and I, we are nothing alike!''\
37''I am a pleasure cruise, you are gone out to trawl,''\
38''Return nets empty, nothing at all.''
39* ArcWords:
40** "Doe eyes" has been a long-lasting term frequently mentioned in their songs.
41*** Eyes are a recurring theme in "Hello Sadness," and the phrase "sad eyes" appears in the last three song songs on the album: To Tundra ("We take on the burden of all these sad-eyed children, with lilies bunched in our hands"), Baby, I Got the Death Rattle ("One look in my sad eyes, she had to concede"), and Light Leaves, Dark Sees Pt. II ("But they request that I leave 'cause my sad eyes are too much to bear").
42** "Heart Swells" and "Documented Minor Emotional Breakdown" have labeled various songs in a semi-ThematicSeries sort of way.
43* UsefulNotes/AssociationFootball: Pops up ''a lot'' in song lyrics, since everyone in the band (but ''especially'' Gareth) is a fan. By the time of ''No Blues'' where Gareth decided to allow himself to be esoteric as he wanted, he makes many European football references that tend to be really obscure if you're not a fan, such as [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RK2aU9m4nW8 "We connected like a Yeboah volley"]] from "Glue Me". He also likes comparing disappointing tournaments to disappointing relationships, such as in "I Broke Up In Amarante" (which mirrors his feelings towards [[UsefulNotes/EuropeanChampionship Euro 2016]], which he considered "largely terrible"), and "Every Defeat is a Divorce (Three Lions)" (in which he compares a divorce to [[MakesJustAsMuchSenseInContext the lions on the English National Football logo coming to life and clawing him to death.)]]
44* AuthorAppeal: Again, '''football.''' Gareth writes a lot about it, with his personal favorite lines being semi-obscure UsefulNotes/AssociationFootball references. The band has a [[https://genius.com/artists/Los-campesinos verified Genius account]] to help explain some of the more of the esoteric ones.
45* BandOfRelatives: Type 1. Gareth and Kim Campesinos! are brother and sister.
46* BreakupSong: The band has lots of these. "Straight in at 101" seems to be a tongue-and-cheek version of a first-hand account of a really awkward, possibly selfish breakup following a bad sexual encounter.
47--> ''So baby, all apologies,''\
48''It was going to happen, inevitably''\
49''And if it helps, I mean, even slightly at all''\
50''It's best to dust yourself down and get straight back on the horse.''
51* BringMeMyBrownPants: During the video for "You! Me! Dancing!," [[ItMakesSenseInContext when the]] {{Kaiju}} [[ItMakesSenseInContext appears, starts vaporizing the army and destroying the city]], the ground units promptly soil themselves.
52* TheBusCameBack: Aleksandra appears on the band's 2013 live album ''A Good Night for a Fist Fight'', singing on "Sweet Dreams, Sweet Cheeks". The album was recorded during Ellen's last show as a member of the band in December 2012, three and a half years after Aleks initially left the band.
53* CallAndResponseSong: "The International Tweexcore Underground" is a back-and-forth between a [[IndiePop twee fan]] and a UsefulNotes/{{Punk}}, each one standing up for their respective cultures and harshly criticizing the other.
54* CallBack: The outro to "Here's to the Fourth Time!" from ''Sick Scenes'' has the line "Call it 'The Time Before the Last Time!'", which was the name of a song from ''No Blues.''
55* CarefulWithThatAxe: Gareth suddenly screams the last line of the page quote from "We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed," as well as his line during the chorus of "Ways to Make it Through the Wall." It's especially noticeable during live performances to the point of near-incomprehensibility.
56* TheCoverChangesTheGender: Averted, probably on purpose, with their cover of Heavenly's famed duet with Calvin Johnson of Beat Happening, "C Is the Heavenly Option". That is, Calvin Johnson's part is sung by the female Aleksandra, and Heavenly guitarist Amelia Fletcher's part is sung by the male Gareth. [[WordOfGod Gareth]] has said in an interview that it was mainly because he wanted to do Amelia's spoken/rapped breakdown.
57* CoverVersion: A favorite of the band for B-sides early in their career. Aside from the cover of Heavenly's "C is the Heavenly Option", they also recorded covers of "Frontwards" by Music/{{Pavement}}, "Yr Boyfriend" by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, "The Eyebright Bugler" by Deerhoof and "Police Story" by Music/BlackFlag.
58* {{Crossover}}: A rather inexplicable one in the music video for "5 Flucloxacillin," which is framed as an episode of the British TV program ''[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bargain_Hunt Bargain Hunt.]]''
59* DarkerAndEdgier: While they still have quite a few poppier numbers on their more recent albums, they're far more noisier and lyrically dense than their earlier songs. Compare 2006's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqY_ZJKAupw It Started with a Mixx]]" to 2010's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-cWxcC5oRM This is a Flag, There is No Wind]]" to 2013's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irSOwulDsPE Cemetery Gaits]]".
60* DoggedNiceGuy: Explored in "There Are Listed Buildings," in which a girl lets the narrator hang around her while she looks for a fulfilling relationship. She's stressed out that she can't find one, and she recognizes that it might actually be because of the narrator, until she frustratedly settles for the close NiceGuy than nothing at all, and the two are willing to give it a try.
61* DrivenToSuicide: In the music video for "By Your Hand" and seemingly attempted in the video for "Avocado, Baby."
62* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: While Los Campesinos! has always circled around IndiePop, ''Sticking Fingers into Sockets'' and ''Hold on Now, Youngster...'' are far, ''far'' more along the lines of upbeat twee pop. Everything since has sounded far more mature and more emotional, if not occasionally noisy. This is an unusual case of this trope, given that their early poppier material is perhaps their best known work.
63** In particular, ''Hold On Now, Youngster...'' was released just eight months before ''We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed'' introduced the sound that they would continue pursuing from there on out. ''Youngster'' largely contained songs that the band had been performing for years, while ''Doomed'' included songs that they wrote specifically for the album.
64* EitherOrTitle: "A Heat Rash in the Shape of the Show Me State; or, Letters from Me to Charlotte"
65* EpicInstrumentalOpener: The first 1:42 of "You! Me! Dancing!", a gradually building wall of noise before the main riff hits. The sense of anticipation it gives off was used nicely (in abridged form) in an [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0kC0YvFwgo advertisment for Budweiser beer.]]
66* FadeOut: "Baby I Got The Death Rattle" has one.
67* GasMaskMooks: A good chunk of the soldiers in the video for "We Throw Parties, You Throw Knives" are these, expendability and all.
68* GenreShift: They had a poppier sound on ''Sticking Fingers into Sockets'' and ''Hold On Now, Youngster...'', but then band's music got darker and noisier on their next few albums. Early WordOfGod had it that ''Hello Sadness'' was to be a slight return to their early poppy sound, but instead it wound up being the darkest album they ever released.
69* GrowingUpSucks: Much of ''Sick Scenes'' seems to hinge around this theme, with many songs revolving around growing anxiety with the world, nostalgia for things slowly breaking down, and a general quarter-life crisis, but done through a [[LyricalDissonance still-lively,]] [[SelfDeprecation self-aware]] and mature perspective.
70* HiddenTrack: ''Hold On Now, Youngster...'' contains an unlisted track, the largely instrumental "2007: The Year Punk Broke (My Heart)" as its 12th song. The band claims its supposed to be an epilogue and not an actual song on the album, hence it being an unlisted, separate track and not hidden after the 11th song.
71** On the vinyl release of the album, the song is included on a separate 10" disc.
72* HopeSpringsEternal: A key lyric in the chorus of the TitleTrack for ''Hello Sadness''.
73* InMediasRes: The name of the first song on ''Romance is Boring''. The first line of the song "...But let's talk about you for a minute" suggests that the song itself begins in medias res.
74* {{Instrumentals}}: "Between an Erupting Earth and an Exploding Sky" from ''We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed'' and "200-102" from ''Romance is Boring'' are purely instrumental. "2007: The Year Punk Broke (My Heart)," ''Hold On Now, Youngster...'s'' HiddenTrack is almost one, only having vocals for the first 30 seconds out of 4 and a half minutes.
75* InsistentTerminology: The band and their label originally claimed ''We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed'' wasn't their second album. They initially called it an "EEP", an "[[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment Extended Extended Play]]". Wikipedia calls it a "mini-album" instead. Gareth eventually relented to calling ''WABWAD'' their second album:
76--> '' I annoyed a lot of people by insisting for a number of years that it was an EP. However, these days, I myself get annoyed when long term fans say 'actually, it's an EP', because I want to be able to say that 'my band has released six albums' not 'my band has released five albums' because it makes us seem like we've been more important for longer.'' - Gareth in ''[[https://noisey.vice.com/en_ca/article/los-campesinos-rank-their-first-five-records Noisey]]'', 2017.
77* IntercourseWithYou: A few of their songs mention sex as a major element, such as "Straight in at 101" and "Here's to the Fourth Time!", but Los Camp being the way they are, it usually ends up [[CringeComedy very sad.]]
78* LighterAndSofter: Starting from around ''No Blues'' or possibly ''Hello Sadness,'' the band's sound has overall become cleaner and livelier, and their themes less maudlin and depressing, though they still retain their contemplative lyrical density.
79* ListSong: "My Year In Lists" is a bit of a subversion, as the singer ''"declines"'' the request to compile a list.
80* LiveAlbum: As listed above, ''A Good Night For A Fist Fight'' documents Ellen's last show with the band in November 2012.
81* TheLostLenore: Quite a few of the songs across multiple albums, such as "The Sea is a Good Place to Think of the Future", "Coda: A Burn Scar in the Shape of the Sooner State" and "Hate For the Island" are all about to how the narrator's lover is either suicidal, dying, or already dead, and how it affects the narrator, though it's unclear if these are all referring to the same set of characters.
82* LyricalDissonance: The band's discography has always had somewhat macabre or depressingly contemplative lyrics that seem jarring when put next to their usually upbeat instrumentation. It's became slightly less prominent [[DarkerAndEdgier and more fitting starting around as the music itself became darker,]] but pops up again every once in awhile.
83** By the time of ''No Blues'' and ''Sick Scenes,'' the band has seemed to reach a sort of a halfway point. The lyrics have grown much more self-aware and reflective, [[BlackComedy more humorous]] than visceral, and the music itself has gotten cleaner and slightly more diverse, both likely a result of the band having grown by a decade at this point.
84* MoodWhiplash: Near the end of ''Romance is Boring,'' the subdued, melancholy, and somewhat bleakly-ended "The Sea is a Good Place to Think of the Future" is immediately followed by the much more upbeat "This is a Flag, There is No Wind," with all the bandmates happily shouting ''[[LeaningOnTheFourthWall "Can we all please just calm the fuck down!?"]]''
85* NonAppearingTitle: Quite a few. Among them are "Death to Los Campesinos!", "Plan A", "Who Fell Asleep In", "It's Never That Easy Though, Is It? (Song for [[Creator/KurtVonnegut the Other Kurt]])" and "Knee Deep At ATP"
86** Astonishingly averted with "This Is How You Spell 'HAHAHA, We Destroyed the Hopes and Dreams of a Generation of Faux-Romantics'"
87* OnceForYesTwiceForNo: The final lines of "Sweet Dreams, Sweet Cheeks"
88* TheOner: The music video for "Avocado, Baby."
89* OtherCommonMusicVideoConcepts: "Death to Los Campesinos!" is one of the "In The Studio" ones...until the band starts being attacked (and killed) by flowers, rainbows, kittens and ribbons. Apparently, it was made as band's reaction to being pigeonholed and dismissed as a "twee band."
90* PurpleProse: Many of Gareth's lyrics, especially later on, use a lot of wordplay, ornate metaphors and references that have varying levels of obscurity (from European football to [[Myth/ClassicalMythology Roman mythology]] and [[UsefulNotes/{{Constellations}} astronomical constellations]]) that, while not too distracting, can be hard to decipher. Gareth seems completely aware of this, though, and even references this trope in "As Lucerne/The Low":
91-->''"My prose is purple, but not as pretty as Lucer-er-er-erne!''\
92''For sweet nothings from the lips of a gargoyle, nobody ever yearned."''
93* UsefulNotes/{{Punk}}: Was always a light part of their aesthetic, sharing some of the visual style in a few promotional images and the general philosophy in frustration with the world. This was prominent even back in their "Hold On Now, Youngster..." days, with "International Tweexcore Underground" being a back-and-forth between IndiePop fan and a punk, making references to prominent figures for each genre. Amusingly, one of the B-sides for that song was a completely straight cover of [[Music/BlackFlag Black Flag's]] "Police Story."
94* ReligionRantSong: ''Possibly'' a Type 2 version with "We've Got Your Back (Documented Minor Emotional Breakdown #2)," [[DualMeaningChorus though it could just be the narrator talking about a girl and her body:]]
95--> ''"I've learned more from toilet walls than I've learned from these words of yours''\
96''Your feelings are buried in scriptures and fictions,''\
97''it's all in the words, but I'm here for the pictures..."''
98* RockStarSong: The first verse of "Songs About Your Girlfriend" comes across as a tongue-in-cheek version of this, which according to Gareth, were slightly adapted from rapper T.I.'s hit single "What You Know" .
99-->''"You do not like us 'cause your girlfriend likely does, and all her friends agree on her soft spot for me, I'll have my hard hands over her soft spots soon, you will see"''
100* {{Scatting}}: "Broken Heartbeats Sound Like Breakbeats" briefly features some in the second verse.
101* SelfDeprecation: Lots of it in various lyrics (see the page quote for one example), but it comes to the forefront during Gareth's between-song stage banter on ''A Good Night For a Fistfight:''
102--> "This was a single, which means either it was a really popular song, or we released the wrong song as a single. I think we all know which we're more likely to do."
103** During the music video of "5 Flucloxacillin" as Gareth's ''Bargain Hunt'' team is scouring through vinyls, they come across their own ''Hold On Now, Youngster...''. Gareth's reaction is to ashamedly facepalm.
104* SequelSong: An odd case where the sequel came out before the original -- ''Hello Sadness'' ends with "Light Leaves, Dark Sees Pt. II", while "Pt. I" was only later released through the ''Heat Rash'' zines (and later on the ''Whole Damn Body'' compilation). Both are sentimental love songs that [[ArcWords reuse the refrain of "when the light leaves, the dark sees"]], "Pt. I" being upbeat, cheerful, and optimistic, while "Pt. II" is much slower, maudlin, and bittersweet.
105* ShipsThatPassInTheNight: Invoked - The bridge of "Romance is Boring" provides one of the trope's page quotes.
106* ShoutOut: The band tends to make references from all over the place, from musical inspirations to [[AuthorAppeal obscure European football history.]]
107** "The International Tweexcore Underground," being all about the banter between a punk and a twee fan and their respective ideologies, namedrops a few names from both groups in the bridges: Music/HenryRollins, Amelia Fletcher, [[Music/MinorThreat Ian]] [[Music/{{Fugazi}} MacKaye,]] Calvin Johnson, Sarah Records, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking "whatever,"]] and the title/concept of the song is a reference to the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Pop_Underground_Convention International Pop Underground Convention.]]
108*** Funnily enough, the B-sides of this track's single are covers of songs by some of the named artists: "C is the Heavenly Option" by Heavenly (Amelia Fletcher) with guest vocals by Calvin Johnson, and "Police Story" by Music/BlackFlag (Henry Rollins).
109** "We Are All Accelerated Readers" name-drops Bonnie Tyler and Toni Braxton, and there's this line:
110--> ''And no more conversations about what ''[[Film/TheBreakfastClub Breakfast Club]]'' character you'd be,''\
111''I'd be the one that dies (No-one dies) Well, then what's the point?''
112** The "bake phallic cake" line from the song "Romance Is Boring" is a reference to "I Love You (But You're Boring)" by Gareth Campesinos!'s all-time favourite band, Music/TheBeautifulSouth (a song which they would later cover as well).
113*** Another Beautiful South reference comes in the title of "Straight In At 101," referencing the song "Straight in at 37."
114** In 2013, the band started selling t-shirts with the slogan "You! Me! [[Creator/TedDanson Danson!]]"
115** The ending lyric to "Heart Swells/Pacific Daylight Time," "some things are best left unsaid" is a reference to “Love Connection” by Music/ParentheticalGirls.
116** From "Every Defeat a Divorce (Three Lions)", the line "But how could I ever refuse / I feel like I lose when I lose" is almost identical to the line from [[Music/{{ABBA}} ABBA's]] "Waterloo," "And how could I ever refuse / I feel like I ''win'' when I lose."
117** The title of the Heat Rash zine-exclusive song "Tiptoe Through the True Bits" appears to be a reference to [[Music/TinyTim "Tiptoe Through The Tulips."]]
118** The final line to "Here's to the Fourth Time!" is "Call it [[CallBack 'The Time Before the Last Time!']] Or 'Good News For Her Mother'!" "Good News For Her Mother!" is the title of an obscure poem by B.S. Johnson, Gareth's favorite author.
119* SillyLoveSongs: While the band tend to shy away from these sort of songs, "Heart Swells/Pacific Daylight Time" is acknowledged specifically on ''A Good Night For A Fistfight'' as being "the first proper, genuine, love song we ever wrote".
120-->''I don't want to sound trite, but you are perfect''\
121''The way you look could seriously make nature dysmorphic''\
122''I wish that you would kiss me 'til the point of paralysis''\
123''The way I flail my arms in front of you it just embarrasses''
124* SillyRabbitRomanceIsForKids: The band often refers to this theme, especially within the aptly-named album ''Romance is Boring'', which is a collage of mediocre relationships amidst the general ennui of a quarter-life crisis. The TitleTrack is an ironic anthem towards just how much the romance between the narrator and their lover ''sucks'', both parties longing for something fulfilling [[DeadSparks but becoming too apathetic and jaded to even break up what clearly isn't working]]. As Gareth said in an interview:
125-->'''[[https://web.archive.org/web/20111010230655/http://www.nerve.com/advice/sex-advice-from/sex-advice-from-los-campesinos?page=3 Nerve]]''': Why is romance boring?\
126'''Gareth''': It's not. It's boring in the same way I say [=iPads=] are shit — because I want an [=iPad=] but can't afford one.
127* SitcomArchNemesis: Gareth's dislike of folk punk singer/songwriter Music/FrankTurner often takes a turn into this direction.
128* TheSixthRanger: Rob. He started out as their opening act with his solo project Sparky Deathcap in 2008 and slowly worked his way to being an official member by 2010.
129* StageNames: The shared "Campesinos" surname.
130* StopAndGo: "Death To Los Campesinos!" features one, which is often left hanging for as long as possible when played live.
131* SpokenWordInMusic: Quite a few songs (particularly from earlier albums) have spoken sections.
132** "You! Me! Dancing!" has a spoken word outro.
133** "This Is How You Spell 'HAHAHA, We Destroyed The Hopes And Dreams Of A Generation of Faux-Romantics' has a spoken middle section.
134** "We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed" has a couple.
135** Rob's "Graceful, gracious companion" part from "By Your Hand" could also count.
136* StealingFromTheTill: The chorus of "Death to Los Campesinos!"
137-->''"If you catch me with my hands in the till, I promise, sugar I wasn't trying to steal..."''
138* TextlessAlbumCover: ''Romance Is Boring''
139* ThemeNaming: The shared "Campesinos" surname.
140* UnpluggedVersion: in 2010 the band released the ''All's Well That Ends'' EP, containing acoustic versions of songs from ''Romance Is Boring''.
141* VocalEvolution: Gareth's voice has gotten noticeably deeper as time has went on. Compare the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTbj0Wyx12Q original recording of "We Throw Parties, You Throw Knives"]] to [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P28TO9FBNN4 a more recent live version.]]
142** Come ''Sick Scenes'' after a [[SequelGap 4-year gap between album releases,]] Gareth's voice has gotten noticeably more gentle and melodic on certain songs such as "5 Flucloxacillin" and "The Fall of Home." You'll be forgiven thinking it's actually an entirely different singer.
143* VocalTagTeam: Gareth and Aleks, particularly on "Death to Los Campesinos!", "Drop It Doe Eyes", "My Year In Lists", "The End of the Asterisk", and "Documented Emotional Breakdown #2 (We've Got Your Back)".
144** After Aleks' departure, Kim took up the role on the older songs, as well as singing the chorus on "The Black Bird, The Dark Slope"

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