Rocktrospectiva: The Acclaimed "You Could Have It So Much Better" Turns 20

Released on 28 September 2005 "You Could Have It So Much Better" was the second studio album by Scottish indie rock band Franz Ferdinand. The album spawned four UK top 30 singles: "Do You Want To", "The Fallen", "Walk Away" and "Eleanor Put Your Boots On."

The album became the band's first UK number-one album, and although their debut album was relatively successful in the United States, going platinum and reaching number 32, You Could Have It So Much Better managed to reach number 8 and earn gold status in the United States. The cover design is modeled on Alexander Rodchenko's 1924 portrait of Lilya Brik. It was produced by Rich Costey and Franz Ferdinand.

Initially it was reported that the album would simply be eponymous like the debut album, 2004's Franz Ferdinand. Singer Alex Kapranos explained, "The whole point is that the album doesn't have a title. We decided quite a while ago that we didn't want to give any of the albums titles, they were just going to be called 'Franz Ferdinand'."

He added, "The albums are going to be identified by their colour schemes rather than a title. The contrast of different colours creates a different mood. We experimented with different combinations of colours and this one stuck. At one level they looked good together, and they capture the mood of this record quite well." However, on 1 August it was revealed that the band had changed their minds and decided to give the album a name. The title was also initially reported as the lengthy You Could Have It So Much Better... With Franz Ferdinand. The album's cover art is inspired by the works of Alexander Rodchenko, the Russian avant-garde photographer and collage pioneer. In particular, the cover image is a direct copy of Rodchenko's of Lilya Brik.

Franz Ferdinand, like many was an effective singles band, "Do You Want To", the lead single from this album, was another real deal for the band, and they had the chance to kept on sounding like that across the length of this album: gleefully unselfconscious, increasingly glammy and trad-rock, and almost disturbingly amped-up, to the point where most of these songs feel like they're spewing confetti all over themselves, whether you feel like helping or not. Some stretches are packed with so many hooks and effortless swings and shifts and yowls that you might start to ignore them entirely.

Even thought this record was full of energetic twists and flourishes that don't quite make up for a lack of real, memorable songs, tracks like "Walk Away", "Eleanor Put Your Boots on", and "Fade Together", where the band key moments on this album, by these style-conscious art kids who played at the time to be a fine, entertaining pop band.

The album was the first chart topping album for both the band and their label, Domino Recording Company, in the UK. 

You Could Have It So Much Better received universal acclaim from music critics, praising the way the band showed working harder and sounding bigger, befitting their stature as rock's saviors of the moment", the album had deeper roots in the first wave of white electric dance music, also the band sounded exactly like the way listener and fans expected with pumping disco beats and lookin'-sharp guitars on track after propulsive track, and called it "so much better than its predecessor" thanks to Kapranos' "dubious sensitivity".

 

You Could Have It So Much Better Track List:  

 

1. The Fallen

2. Do You Want To

3. This Boy

4. Walk Away

5. Evil And Heathen

6. You're The Reason I'm Leaving

7. Eleanor Put Your Boots On

8. Wll That Was Easy

9. What You Meant

10. I'm Your Villain

11. You Could Have It So Much Better

12. Fade Together

13. Outsiders