Song reviews

Mellow is as mellow does and, in the best indie pop tradition, Wojtek The Bear emote their way through “Slowly, Then All At Once” as if ordering the last cappuccino in the world with the chorus and a bit of fiddle adding the essential foam.

I am of the opinion that I should know who Billy Reeves is but, no matter, for “Soapbox!” is powered by enough retro synth pop minimalism and repetitive ranting to make you wish it was the past again. Beep beep boom.

There is plenty of laid back elegance to be found in “Who Do You Love” by Asaf Ashkenazy. It’s a mellow love song, of course, and the world needs plenty of those so, easy on the ear and soothing to the heart, this song works for me.

Endearingly retro, Cadet Carter dance their way through their emo seasoned power punk song “Lift Me Up” with all those guitars and choruses making you wish you were back in the day when going to the shopping mall was the thing to do.

The sound of brooding synthesiser repetition once again reaches my ears with CCTemple looping the atmosphere right into “Homeseq” and somehow simultaneously managing to inject style into all that he sequences. Plastic perfection.

Whilst “Red Stripe Remedy” plays out like a fairly energetic attempt to do something anarchic with that very familiar indie rock vibe, Lock-In still manage to sound like someone else. I didn’t need a watch to know this one went over the three minute limit.

Where is today to be found but in yesterday and Norwegian band Laughing Stock duly take us on a journey of enlightenment back to the fuzzy days of prog rock with “A New Home” woozily swaying in a breeze of late sixties rock influences. Groovy!

Helen Townsend jumps in at the deeper end of the Americana pool with her song “Battlefield”. The song is, of course, a love song of the broken down blue collar variety but it’s nicely put together in a seventies folk rock kind of way.

It must have been a long week as I don’t normally go for quirky indie pop yet there was something, almost manically, appealing about “Get Atomic” by The Creachies. The song is all sugary and fluffy but, although we don’t admit it, we all like candy floss.

It is getting to be the time of year when the sentimental duet becomes once more popular. “Years” is indeed such a duet that definitely strolls on the showtune side of the street but the elegant Shaw and Kent vocals make the whole thing worthwhile.

Rhea plunder the retro rock vibe with their song “Creeping Through My Head” and, if you like your guitars loud and your choruses singalong, then this one will be for you. A song that should sound good through a stadium sized PA system.

The first time I heard “Chemical Oblivion” I thought that some American band had discovered British indie rock and decided that it needed even more power chords. Fortunately, REDSMITHVII are both British and also do literate lyrics. Play loud!