“He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.” Nietzsche had an extensive array of unique chat-up lines, which may go some way to explaining why he never married. However, we may return to him shortly.
The ubiquitous Blossoms have been impossible to ignore in recent months, relentlessly driven forward on a collective bandwagon of major label cash and premier league PR. If they are yet to cross your field of vision then you’re either a cave dweller or Tim Peake. Now, at long last, their debut release is upon us, imaginatively titled Blossoms. Yes, really. As expected, Blossoms present twelve tracks of lament and heartbreak set against the backdrop of an imposing and destitute Stockport skyline…or at least I wish they had.
Blossoms is shiny, polished and machine-tooled to within a gnat’s whisker of its humble existence with the opening three tracks indicative of their personal manifesto. All three singles ‘Charlemagne‘, ‘At Most A Kiss’ and ‘Getaway’ are drenched in sickly sweet synths coupled with teeth-rotting melodies which frustratingly bury their way into your cranium and refuse to be coaxed out. Think A-ha at their most soporific and you’re in the right ballpark. Amazingly, they follow this up with ‘Honey Sweet‘ which is precisely what it says on the tin.
What has always troubled me about Blossoms is that I’m never convinced of who they really are. The Music Industry Rule Book dictates that five long-haired scruffy urchins from ‘oop North’ ought to be churning out wholesome indie rock and not glossy pop so clean you could eat your Sunday lunch off it. So are Blossoms merely pretenders who are being touted around by their label or is there far more depth than their early singles would indicate? Well if you put the banal, vacuous lyrics to one side then the remainder of Blossoms reveals an enigmatic underbelly. ‘Smashed Pianos’, for example, is a weird hybrid of a T-Rex stomp combined with the melancholy of fellow Mancunians I Am Kloot. Similarly, ‘My Favourite Room‘, arguably the stand out track, seemingly a local homage to Chorley boys Starsailor. Stripped of the infuriating keyboards, this is a simple paean to love and loss and if Blossoms want to endure in the industry this is where their future lay.
‘Cut Me And I’ll Bleed’ is The Verve having a day off, just to complete the North-West eye-spy and ‘Blow‘ is more glam-rock to stamp your clogs to, although why it’s buried so far down the album isn’t obvious…or perhaps it is. Left to their own devices, Blossoms could…well…blossom. But right now they are hot property and Blossoms feels rushed and incomplete just to satisfy the business model.
Or perhaps I’ve spent too long gazing into the abyss and Blossoms is what stares back. As Nietzsche would doubtless advise us, existential nihilism dictates that all human life is insignificant and meaningless anyway so whatever I say, Blossoms will sell by the bucket-load. Blossoms, a nihilists wet-dream, they should put that on the poster.
Blossoms is released on 5th August on Virgin EMI
