The Shout Out Louds – Our Ill Wills
Sometimes the search for the catchy single can have slightly adverse effects on the perception of a record. Tonight I Have to Leave It, the superbly infectious Cure-a-like opener to this album was the only song I knew when I first put the whole thing on the record player.
Consequently, I completely missed the whole album the first time through. I don’t even know how I ended up listening to it again really, because I dismissed it as bland and soft and not really good enough. This was completely wrong. I think I was expecting more guitars, more angst, maybe even more rock. In fact, instead of Tonight I Have to Leave It being a typical song, it is actually at the far end of the spectrum inhabited by this album. The rest slides from 80s retro-indie through polished and bouncy indie-pop to wistfully twee lament but the key word, instead of being indie, is pop.
This is actually a splendid pop album, not the angsty indie one I had anticipated, which I suppose is the reason it took me so long to adjust. Sure, the sound is still massively informed by 80s British indie, but it is given a shimmering pop sheen by the lush duets and the bouncy production. So, over the course of about ten listens, this went from a disappointment which was entirely my own fault, to one of my favourite recent purchases. Poor bloody musicians really don’t deserve to be at the mercy of such fickle blinkering on the part of their audience they really don’t. It’s a brilliant album people, buy it!
The Shout Out Louds – South America
The Shout Out Louds – Blue Headlights
jaysus, toad, it’s like we’re of half the same mind. i was just listening to “tonight we have to leave it” and thinking how very damn catchy those cowbells are at the very beginning and i thought, jeeze, i should explore this band further. and now you’ve gone and done it for me!
this is like the third time in three weeks that you’ve written about a band that was in my mental pipeline.
and what’s that song that it’s making me think of when he sings “give love, give love, give love”?
Good stuff Mr. Toad
funnily enough his voice also reminds me of Pete Wylie of Wah! Or maybe that’s just me. Anyway, will have to investigate further…
This and Howl Howl Gaff Gaff are both really good.
Marcy, on the “Give Love” bits, perhaps you are thinking of U2 (not sure which song)…am I correct?
i finally figured it out–it’s “under pressure” by queen/bowie, near the end. it’s not all that similar, it just triggered an association.
Good grief, I don’t hear that at all! Our brains do work in rather mysterious ways.
again, nice.
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