When I first started writing this review I wrote a few lines about how some music sounds like a warm hug feels; or like sitting in the sun with your friends, like laughing and drinking or dancing and singing. Like the good times, basically.
I ended up deleting these lines (and then restoring them by obliquely referring to them – ha!) because they were sentimental almost to the point of schmaltzy absurdity, but the fact that I wrote them in the first place gives you some idea of how Grown Ups‘ 2009 EP Songs makes me feel. The four songs included are warm, bright and mellow indie/emo tunes with a whole lot of charm. The band’s sound is built around two clean noodling guitars interspersed with hoarse, raspy vocals, and this fusion of technical proficiency and rough & ready pop-punk really appeals to me. What would we call this? “Ambient punk”?
The band’s lineage can probably be traced back to outfits like Sunny Day Real Estate and the Promise Ring, whilst the most obvious contemporary comparison is Castevet (with whom the band have recently toured). Bridge & Tunnel are a fair comparison also, though Grown Ups have a much less heavy sound; Algernon Cadwallader are also not entirely dissimilar.
Probably the stand-out track for me is ‘Three Day Weekend’, which varies between fast-paced fist in the air parts and gorgeous, playful lead riffs that have me thinking of the lazy summer days ahead.
Songs is available free from both Big Scary Monsters (via the ‘Friend of the Family’ scheme) and If You Make It. The band also have a MySpace page. Oh, and their UK tour starts on Thursday, so check them out!
[...] Ups, and it’s good to be able to say that with More Songs they’re even better than with the Songs EP. In fact, the four songs from the EP – ‘Surprise Party’, ‘Open [...]