Song reviews

Fusion cookery doesn’t do much for me and “Monaco” by Scottish band Dirty Money Handlers similarly suffers from having ingredients that seem to have been put together for the sole purpose of appearing to be different. The socially conscious rap in the middle indicates that the band has its collective heart in the right place but the song outstays its welcome by a good couple of minutes.

Few bands do the soundtrack to life in the modern day city as well as A Band Called Quinn. “Drive With Your Eyes Closed” is, unsurprisingly, chilled to perfection and delivered with digital precision to the MP3 player in your high end automobile. This song is, to put it simply, a fine example of super cool electro pop.

A neat and intelligent pop song from what would appear to be a new band, “Tyland” shows that Hen-Jenny are girls with both guitars and an independent streak. They do it all in under three minutes too with Jessica Powell’s precise voice leading things with undisguised confidence.

Although powered more by youthful enthusiasm than anything else, there is still a pleasing freshness to Indigo Husk’s song “Grin” with an energetic guitar providing support and counterpoint to the somewhat stylised male vocals. That works for me.

Pleasingly primitive post punk from Austrian band Chick Quest with their rough and ready retro approach energising “Somebody Call A Doctor” whilst, in the background, a trumpet pulls out a spaghetti western motif. It’s a European thing indeed.

Indie rock Canadian style from Montreal band Das Blankout with their song “King Of The World” being tilted more towards the retro style than we would get on this side of the big pond. Nonetheless, on the evidence of this song, Das Blankout are the kind of band that knows just when to take a step backwards.

Whilst atmosphere is given precedence over melody in this downbeat example of Glasgow synth pop, “Sixfour” nonetheless demonstrates that The Claramassa have more musical maturity than most of their robotic competition. It’s the kind of song that grows on you.

“State of Low” is another eloquent slice of modern pop music from Sweden’s Cajsa Siik. Her rather wistful outlook on life shines through the song and makes you think of summer love and other such sentimental things. A nicely understated song.

Just when you think that you’ll never hear another protest song, along comes “Taliban Man” from Cambodia’s Krom. A rough edged male voice preaches the righteous words on the killing of the innocent whilst making you wonder why so few musicians on this side of the planet bother to make comment on what is happening in the world. Maybe they just don’t have the right app on their iPhone?

“Temples” shows that London band Panic Island can generate more than enough energy to charge up the average venue with indie rock energy. The committed vocals are plugged into the mains and thus help the song transcend the limited production values.

Kind of ethereal in their outlook, Taxi Taxi take “Floating Forever” out on the town for a metaphysical drink or two. This might well be yet more Swedish electro pop but, this time, the sound of the shadows is there for all to hear.

Downright downbeat, Irish singer songwriter Roberta Howett injects heartfelt sentiments into “Broken Wings” to pump up all that piano powered emotion. If Girls Aloud were still in the charts, this would be their ballad of choice but, in the here and now, Ms. Howett still has a song likely to trouble the top 40.