Sort-of successful alt-rock types return for their second album…
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[5.45]
Dave Moore: Buzzing indie guitar anthem. Or at least a band pretending it’s not Christian hard rock (far as I can tell it’s not, so fair ’nuff) covering “Myxamatosis” sorta thing. But then it goes on a bit too long.
[6]
Fergal O’Reilly: Silversun Pickups’ Wikipedia page states that their name is “a state of mind, supposedly from living so close to everything an L.A.-based indie rock band would need late at night”. Interestingly, in their case this is actually a barber and some VapoRub. Their song ploughs an unremarkable 90s alt/grunge furrow for slightly too long, and while the chorus is quite pretty in an unspectacular here-are-four-chords way, the singer’s weird, fey rasp is a little incongruous in that it is what I would expect a Brian Peppers guest vocal to sound like. There is also the more pressing concern that, in the words of one disgruntled internet commenter, “they make downloading songs by late ’90s Britpop legends Silver Sun difficult”, so that’s morally indefensible on two counts.
[4]
Joseph McCombs: Band’s come a long way in a short span of time since their Pikul EP, which I found dire. Here they’re confident yet restrained, taking their time and stretching out before getting into the verse and chorus. I’ve dinged them a point for “release the glitch,” though; one must have some standards.
[7]
Martin Kavka: This is the kind of music that hipster college kids fall in love with and maybe even purchase, but then delete it from their hard drives or put it up for sale on eBay three years after graduating. Like those kids, this song thinks it’s far more interesting than it actually is.
[3]
Tom Ewing: The term “shoegaze” now seems to stretch to anyone who makes anything that Steve Lamacq would have liked in 1989. I can understand trying to sound like My Bloody Valentine. I can wrap my head around taking Lush, or Ride, or even Chapterhouse as your model. But The Family Cat?? In fact, even remembering the Family Cat should disqualify me from listening to this, which is made by and for the young people. So consider this a virtual clip round the ear. They make an adequate racket but I could have done without that grey smear of a voice on top of it.
[3]
Hazel Robinson : Swoon is my album of the year thus far but this feels like a really odd single from it. “Catch and Release” or “The Royal We” would’ve made more sense. This does have a bit that sounds strangely like “Earth Song”, though, so there’s that. Plus I am a sucker for aggressive fuzz.
[8]
Jordan Sargent: Listening to any post-“Lazy Eye” Silversun Pickups single feels a little pointless — obviously they’re never going to come close to replicating that song’s greatness, and it’s hard for everything else in its wake to not feel like a disappointment. “Panic Switch” lacks that song’s instant-classic opening chords and its lilting melodies and, most importantly, its expert use of quiet-to-loud dynamics. It also, unlike “Lazy Eye”, doesn’t sound like the best song Jimmy Eat World never wrote, and in that case I definitely have no use for them.
[4]
Ian Mathers: This is the kind of single I can’t help but like, even if I don’t really respect it. I’m pretty sure listening to more than one Silversun Pickups song in a row would be annoying, but they nail the chorus to this one hard enough that it’s hard not to want to listen to it again. It’s too long, the lyrics are silly, it’s an egregious appropriation of late 90s alt-sonics… but can I play it just one more time?
[7]
Additional Scores
Hillary Brown: [5]
John M. Cunningham: [7]
Alex Wisgard: [6]