Labels: self released
Review by: Andy Malcolm
Well it was snowing outside today at least. Snow, man. Anyway, the Snowman have gone and had a go at recording a few of their songs properly after the incredible “hype” that surrounded the “leaked” recordings of their first practice session, and they have obviously been practicing quite heavily in the meantime as they now have a sound that I can actually make out. The first song is just over 2 minutes long, and is titled “Chinaski in Love”. It’s an excitable burst of frenzied crying and manic instrument bashing. The vocals are distraught and are a bit like Bob Tilton Junior. Robbie Tilton perhaps. This is good stuff, but I really can’t stand the parts where one of the guitars goes all fuzzy and metal or something. I don’t know the technical word for what they are doing, but it sounds awful to my ears and really doesn’t fit in, but hey. There’s a really nice melodic part in the middle of the song where things gently sway back and forth for a while. Liked that. The second song is a song that featured on the practice tape, “the Light At the End of the Tunnel Has Been Turned Off”. That’s a bit too jokey to be emo I’m afraid. The music is good though, starting off with a gentle introduction that builds up in traditional fashion. Urgent talked vocals over nicely wandering bass. I should say that for a bunch of young dudes, the lyrics to this track are really rather decent and effecting. The song as a whole is really lengthy, again there are some widdly guitar bits that I personally would have dispensed with, but on the whole this is rather quality even if it is basically a Don Martin 3 / I Hate Myself tribute with added twiddly metal bits. I have no bats! I have no Matt! To reiterate: what a spazz.
These guys have been together about what, a month now? And they are getting things together and improving at quite a pace. Be interesting to hear what they do next, and what they do when at age 9 in a years time when they are all burned out on emo and want to play psychedelic jazz music influenced by Joy Division and Supertramp. Personally, I can’t wait.