First and foremost – let’s get one thing straight – this band is so like Oasis and The Verve it is almost frightening. The vocal styles, the mannerisms, the musical styles, the lush strings, the 60’s influences, the production, the haircuts, oh, I could go on and on, but I’m sure you get my drift. Now don’t get me wrong, I like Oasis and The Verve (to a lesser extent), but every time I put this album on, I see Richard Ashcroft/Liam Gallagher singing these songs. So, does that mean this album is a piece of piss? The fact that it appears to have no individual identity of its own? Well, we could go down that road immediately, but let’s first delve a little deeper.
The band are a four piece hailing from Bradford, vocals and lead guitar by two brothers (who does that remind you of?), with the older brother being the guitarist who joined the band after a couple of years when they were going nowhere basically, and gave them a kick up the arse. Since then, things have started happening for the band and the debut album finds a disc of anthem style epics “All You Good Good People“, “Come Back To What You Know“, “I Want The World“, the title track, “You’ve Got To Say Yes“…..and so on. Lead singer Danny McNamara has a vocal style that does not quite have the same range and versatile of Ashcroft and Gallagher, while much of the music relies on string arrangements for the effects and the production is slick and glossy.
If you are an ardent fan of The Verve and Oasis then no doubt you will love this album, as it embodies all of their strong points, but if not, I’d advise you to leave it on the shelf. Rumour has it the band want to experiment more on the next album, using samples for instance, but if truth be told all the samples are here already in the form of The Verve and Oasis.
Still, maybe they will surprise us. So, overall assessment of this album? I suppose it sets out all that it was supposed to achieve, in that there are reasonably good songs contained herein and it will be successful in terms of sales. As to originality, I don’t see much evidence of it, while career span will be dependent on how long the likes of The Verve can sell records.
Taken from Scotland Calling (Scottish Music Network)
