LEIKA – ‘Space for Tuesday’
aaamusic | On 06, Mar 2011
Indie rockers LEIKA dig deep into their musical memory to shine through the cream of contemporary composers with four tracks of cleverly interwoven, futuristic yet iconic alt-rock that showcase what is to be expected of their debut long-player – ‘Space on Tuesday’ (set for release on March 7th ).
London-based LEIKA, a band described by industry experts as the missing link between the Buzzcocks and Talking Heads have produced an album that is unashamedly catchy and radio-friendly yet as original and refreshingly varied as their influences are diverse.
Take track ’Silly cow’ as an example, whose spacey synthetic gutar solo and relentless pace comes straight out of Steve Vai’s rule book making this album opener smack of Stevie’s LP ‘Surfing with the alien’.
Track 2 is more relaxed, with a childlike melodic theme throughout, whilst ‘Sitting pretty’ intrigues with its’ continuation of LEIKA’S ‘life on Mars’ stella subscription a la David Bowie. The Lyrics “When I choke on my self-pity and I’m sitting pretty and my smile is pure design” is broodingly persuasive of LEIKA’S hidden agenda.
With a facade that is “pure design”, we are allowed a sign that all is not what it seems, and that this cheeky rebelliousness is but one trick in their wizard’s sleeve.
Finally track ‘Love love love’ curls viper-like around phrase “old-fashioned enough to last forever, modern enough to survive the times”, whilst interwoven throughout with ‘love me do’ harmonies that lend the track an obvious iconic Beatle-esque heads up. In addition, smatterings of trumpetering betray the groups’ aforementioned nu-wave influences.
So, cutting to the chase; this collocation of influence and idiosyncratic artistry “old fashioned enough to last forever,…, modern enough to survive the times” will undoubtedly win over critics and pseudo-intellectual musos the world-over.
A brilliant piece of rebellion out to prove that LEIKA are here to stay, proudly pedantic with neither a smidgeon of plagiarism, nor hint of fallacy.
Inspiring, awesome, classic.
Author: Guy Waddington
