Our job isn’t done until we’ve done some tasteful guitar pop from every country. Today, Thailand!
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[6.14]
Iain Mew: This isn’t the first time and won’t be the last time that an otherwise unremarkable seeming rock song in a language I don’t speak gets through to me by its guitar tone. This one is like when Bloc Party were still using their guitars to evoke the rush of dancefloor epiphanies, except even more heavenly. Lomosonic also pull off a skyscraping double guitar solo that beats the one in “Plans” hands down.
[8]
Jonathan Bogart: Melodic, emo-inflected rock from Thailand is more or less the same as melodic, emo-inflected rock anywhere else in the world; unlike hip-hop, traditional ballads, or dance-pop, there’s no space for local variations on the formula, so it’s all about the lovelorn melodies and sharp-toothed riffs. Lomosonic do a particularly sweet variation — I like the detail of an acoustic guitar in the mix — but “Felt” trades in the same broad strokes of self-pity and instrumental rush that floppy-haired bands from Caracas to Glasgow are mining with just as little self-awareness or leavening sense of humor.
[5]
Brad Shoup: The implication of waltz time, the guitar ping and vocal sigh of late-period Britpop. And a wonderful twin-guitar flurry arguing for a sophistipop extension.
[6]
Daniel Montesinos-Donaghy: Before the vocals come in, this is reminiscent of Japanese instrumental-rock band Toe with the smatterings of acoustic and delayed electric guitar –- the second the vocals hit, the band refuse to build on the body and circle the melody about until touching turns to sappy. “Felt” is a piece of pleasant-sounding music, the type of thing that may stops heartbeats in the body of an album but floats on anhedonically as a one-off.
[5]
Sabina Tang: It suits me admirably to spin swooning, pristine soft indie rock — a fully international style for years — in a language (Thai) that I find euphonious but cannot parse; to understand the vocalist’s romantic travails would be to ruin the song, I suspect. On the other hand, the music also never rises above polite balladry (“Wake,” from last year, has dynamics that more efficiently play to the band’s apparent strengths).
[6]
Edward Okulicz: “Felt” is generic, but if, like me, you think that Coldplay peaked with Parachutes, the chiming guitars will seem sweetly comforting. It’s pleasant for what it is, and I enjoy it, but the last couple of seconds, when Peerasit Poltan sings a couple of longer notes, sound like a distinctive voice was lying in wait for four minutes only to come out for an all-too-brief cameo. I won’t dock the rest of the song points because it’s not the swooning, tender stunner that brief snatch could be ludicrously extrapolated to, but I’ll keep an ear out for their next single just in case.
[7]
Patrick St. Michel: All the drama here comes out through the music, which allows Lomosonic’s Peerasit Poltan to sell the chorus simply, which makes it come across as more aching than if he belted it. “Felt” mostly sounds content to swirl around, but it’s touching even though I can’t understand a lick of Thai.
[6]