aaamusic | On 04, Feb 2014

Ahead of their second album, The Heartbreaks have delivered ‘Hey, Hey Lover’ which has all the sounds of one of the less depressing Manic Street Preachers songs (unsurprising given that it was produced by Dave Eringa). Despite having the image of a band who are trying painfully hard to be trendy, the music comes across well and there is a solid balance throughout the band. The guitar stands out as being particularly impressive, it really takes over when the time for the solo is nigh and carries the song through to the end.

The video could do without the faffing round at the start, though when the song gets going it’s not bad for a simple one location shoot. Matthew Whitehouse has a great voice which has clearly been grown on killer voices from the last few decades and he uses it effectively to draw the listener in. Lyrically it’s nothing special, same old longing for love story. It’s a pretty listenable track that comes from a band with definite potential, but on the whole it’s a little too repetitive for me and could do with adding a bit of variety.

★★★★★

Ciaran Steward