Labels: Dog Knights – Pinky Sweaer
Review by: Andy Malcolm
It’s the one the kids are waiting for, the first UK band to take what the US twiddle bands were doing 2 or 3 years ago and really go to town with it. What I had previously heard of Nai Harvest was enjoyably rough and ready, a bit shambolic and prone to falling apart. On this album they have cleaned a lot of that up and made a ferociously tight record that revolves around boys shouting, and a mix of driving, punky guitars and clean, pretty parts, thus rendering them firmly in the thrall of Algernon Cadwallader and American Football.
The vocals are generally still endearingly ragged when they main guy is wailing away, although they do have an unfortunate habit of getting the gang vocals on, presumably to encourage sing alongs and dudes to crowd surf at their no doubt exceptionally sweaty and entertaining shows. They even drop in a few “Whoo”-s that seem a bit forced and “well, Braid did that, so we should too”. For me, the best songs on this record are bouncy and punky, such as the driving “Sitcom Fade In”, where Nai Harvest up the tempo and keep it there for the duration – these are the most exciting songs and it’s something they could do with exploring a bit more.