There’s a lot of hype surrounding this guitar-rock quartet at the moment and if you were to believe the press, then you’d think they were the next big thing. Their brand of jangly guitar rock/pop is pleasant enough but does it really set the world on fire? Probably not.
With Ronnie Wood almost claiming that they’re the best thing since the Stones they certainly have some great press guaranteed and there may well be a market for them. Allegedly recorded live and in one day, the album often sounds like it. If the occasional off-key note and ill-advised guitar solo is up your street then this is the thing for you.
The opener, Time Machine, could have come straight from the repertoire of Liam Gallagher – not a bad thing some might say (sorry), and the power and effervescence is certainly present – but, it doesn’t continue and isn’t consistent.
There are Beatles influences and maybe even Dylan, and the boys often slip into ’70s MOR ‘safe’ pop. Lyrically they’re often amusing and clever. Some cute rhymes and observations probably save the album on several occasions, as it becomes more of a “listening to words” affair than the tracks as a whole.
It’s a shame, as they can certainly play, and a little more consideration in terms of production and track choice wouldn’t have gone amiss. ‘Original Fool‘ is certainly one of the highlights as it zips from start to end at a frenetic pace with a hook line that is difficult to forget. ‘Solid Gold Tooth‘ then follows and it’s back to mediocre stuff.
‘Red Light Mary‘ dabbles with the blues and is essentially successful albeit nothing particularly special. It’s radio friendly fodder certainly but really doesn’t break any new ground. ‘Solid Gold Tooth‘ slows the pace into a song which could possibly be a lot more – it’s basic, perhaps too basic and lacks a little spark.
Spark is something that seems forced on the album, maybe trying to be more than the songs will allow. A nice hook on ‘Face I Can Trust‘ will certainly have you singing along at some point and as such is probably the album highlight, though there are still vocals that could be ironed out if the urge to record something live and raw was discarded.
Let’s not get too disheartened; there are several glimmers that we might not have heard the last of the boys. ‘Silhouette‘ is again potential radio fodder for pop-powered stations. They seem to have the prospect of coming up with several cracking tunes in the future anyway, and ‘Face That I Can Trust‘ once more echoes the hits of the ’60s and ’70s sounding as though you’ve heard it all before.
