Bought on a whim for a quid in a charity shop, I was pleasantly surprised by this Newcastle band and played the album a few times when I first got it. But, like so many others, it's lain neglected until alphabetically selected for review. It was their debut, and a Mercury Prize nominee, so let's see if it's stood up.
It's a lively slice of power pop, guitar driven with Paul Smith's north-east accent cutting through the songs, and openers Signal And Sign and Apply Some Pressure rock along nicely, as does Graffiti. But by Postcard Of A Painting, it's beginning to sound a bit samey. And that's how it continues - nothing on it is anything other than well crafted and a decent listen, but it doesn't feel like there's much variety as the songs progress. Singles Limassol and The Coast Is Always Changing stand out a bit, and there's the obligatory slower penultimate track in Acrobats, a spoken piece (with sung chorus) over a wall of sound accompaniment, and a jaunty two minutes, Kiss You Better, to finish.
This style of pop, jerky (see Gang Of Four) guitar chops, was much in evidence at this time, and these lads made a pretty good job of it with a very listenable 45 minutes.
3* - a decent slice of mid-noughties power pop, which was never going to change the face of rock'n'roll.
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