aaamusic | On 04, Dec 2011

It’s odd what an opening track can do. As the first taste of an album one knows nothing about it’s invaluable that a band makes the right choice or it can taint the whole album for the listener. Have Ex-Norwegian pulled it off? That would be a no. Jet Lag is a pretty awful opener, it sounds tired, sludgy (and not in a good way) and doesn’t start this record off with the bang it so richly deserves. This could kneecap an album that’s barely started but, fortunately, Sketch, the second effort from the New York based indie rockers, more than makes up for it, and not so much salvages the record, that would assume that Jet Lag stays in one’s memory after it’s played, but rather makes a cohesive, great album out of the remaining nine songs.

Ex Norwegian have a fascinating sound to boot, it’s very guitar based, but at the same time, rather difficult to put ones finger on, think a hybrid of The Beatles and Nirvana covering My Bloody Valentine. Except I’m not entirely sure that the level of awesome that would entail could exist in this feeble universe. But still, second track (opening track in my ideal universe) Smashing Time is an almost impossibly fun slice of slacker pop-rock, like Weezer covering The Beatles, You’re Elastic Over Me showcases the vocal of Carolina Souto, in a way that imagines what would Meg White sound like if she could sing at all, over a surprisingly atmospheric acoustic number. Seconds has the best use of a horn section in an indie rock number since The Replacements’ Can’t Hardly Wait and the fabulously titled Acting on an Island staggers from a strange, flute led intro, grunge-esque verses and a country rock saunter of a pre-chorus. And it works very, very well indeed!

This may be a slightly backhanded compliment, but even the filler’s charming, Girl With The Moustache sounds like a deeply stoned Descendents and even has a catty spoken word intro, while Turn Left sounds like what Green Day’s Warning should have sounded like. So all in all, this is a less than perfect album, the production is basic, but the songwriting more than makes up for it. Just pretend that the first track doesn’t exist, and you’ve got yourself a fantastic album on your hands. Well worth checking out.

Author: Will Howard