It’s not many 7″ records which give you six songs of listening enjoyment, but this is what Hot Lava and the Sad Cobras have achieved on this split EP.  Both have one epic song which just exceeds a Tolstoyian two-and-a-half minutes, but everything else is well under the two minute barrier – not a second wasted.

In all honesty, I am not that taken with the Sad Cobras songs, so I will instead focus on Hot Lava, whose debut album Lavaology I really enjoyed.

Basically, this has the same, slightly frantic charm as the album.  Taskmaster is a lot slower-paced – almost a song you could imagine Camera Obscura aiming for – but it’s the sheer pop joy of this lot which makes these songs so satisfying for me. There’s no need to be deep about this, it’s just bouncy indie pop with plenty of electronic decoration, and really nicely executed melodic twists and turns.  What more need be said?

Hot Lava – The Auctioneer

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Hot Lava MySpace | The Sad Cobras MySpace | Buy the 7″