Labels: self released
Review by: Mike Whelan
I’m guessing Iza like the Flaming Lips, or they did once. Either way, it makes me completely unqualified to review this, I once borrowed a Flaming Lips album from a mate and hated it. Even so, I can still remember enough about it to detect their influence in the Iza sound.
This is a mixture of old and new songs, collated, as their begging bio says, to get them some recognition, or a gig, or a release, anything really. Unhelpfully they don’t explain which are the old and the new, so it’s difficult to tell whether Iza are moving away from the Flaming Lips sound, as three of the tracks sound more like the Happy Mondays with an American singer, or moving towards it.
Even though it’s a collection of songs that are about as fashionable these days as day glo socks, Iza are still pretty good. It isn’t a release that would sit comfortably next to any bands being touted around as the proverbial “next big thing,’ but Iza may well have found their own little niche. It’s just a shame most people think niches are crap.
Well worth a listen, if only for opening track “The Return of Superman,’ which made me smile. Send Iza an e-mail, they’d probably appreciate it.