aaamusic | On 30, May 2011

STOP THE PRESSES! YOUNG BRITISH POST-HARDCORE BAND SOUNDS VAGUELY LIKE BIFFY CLYRO! BUT THIS TIME IT’S AWESOME! Yes, as much of a cliché as it’s become, it seems that there is still something fresh to be found in the combination of huge choruses, tricky time signatures and twenty foot tall, distorted guitar riffs, a feat which most considered to be impossible after the great Only Revolutions triumph of 2009, the glorious sound of a band going stratospheric and a sound jumping the shark. After that album, the cynical view was that any post hardcore band would now try to sound exactly like that album to piggy back on the Kilmarnock trio’s phenomenal success. So, obviously, I was all for it, until this aural rabbit punch came hurtling into my inbox. Godammit Flights, how the hell am I meant to trendily swat away any other post hardcore band that comes my way with a sneering “Biffy Copyist” tag when you sound this fucking good?! I’ve got a reputation to maintain here!

But seriously, this is excellent stuff, opening track The Pretence will knock you for six on first hearing, effortlessly dodging from staccato guitar riffs to soaring three part harmonies in a way that’s simultaneously baffling and exhilarating. With this amount of skill at creating energetic, intelligent rockers it would be easy to pad out the rest of this, the Bristol quartets debut E.P, with more of the same and it would be pretty damn awesome, but of course, they don’t. Just look at instrumental Charity Calendars, an instrumental that could quite easily equal Mogwai in it’s drama, mastery of dynamics and sheer, trouser-flapping volume, it builds and builds to easily the most exciting moment on an album built on exciting moments.

Make no mistake, this is something special. And while I may have overused the BC Words in this review I use them in the most honest way possible. I was jaded when it came to Post Hardcore, too many barely post-pubescent white boys with boy band smiles and haircuts whose care took precedence over writing original songs but this band has made me believe in the redemptive power of the marriage of riffs, screaming and melody again, and I don’t think there’s a higher compliment to be paid to any band.

Author: Will Howard