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Wednesday 11 July 2012

Space - Spiders


Things from Liverpool and its near neighbour,yet fierce rival Manchester are usually good and this is no exception. Beautifully made, great instrumentation, witty lyrics and off kilter vocals make this an interesting listen. Listening to Spiders, the debut album by the Liverpool four-piece Space, you've got to wonder: Is there space enough in Space for each member's musical ambitions? 

They've got a singer/bassist named Tommy Scott who writes uniquely British pop songs filled with eccentric characters and dark humor (think Ray Davies), but who splits his musical fixations between Burt Bacharach-influenced orchestral pop and edgy new wave. There's also lead guitarist, Jamie Murphy, who writes more mainstream guitar rock, with crunching chords and glam lyrics like, "voodoo roller lives in solar." And then there's technophile keyboardist Franny Griffiths, who laces together both of his partners' songs with samples, synth warbles, scratches, and dance beats. At any given point Space can take on characteristics of pop eras from the early '60s to the late '90s, and often more than one at a time.

Mix it all together, though, and the band comes off sounding like a low rent version of Happy Mondays, with their dance grooves and rock guitars dominating the mix. Particularly on Murphy-penned tracks like "Major Pager" and "Lovechild of the Queen" (both pretty rubbish attempts at political commentary actually)

But if ever an album (and a band) were saved on the strength of a few good singles, this is it. The hits "Neighborhood," "Me & You vs. the World," and especially the third single but forst big hit, "Female of the Species"--all Scott compositions--are so damn catchy and lively and clever and dynamic they almost create the impression that Spiders is a great album, when in fact it's only half great.


Neighbourhood
Mister Psycho
Female of the Species
Money
Me and You Versus the World
Lovechild of the Queen
No One Understands
Voodoo Roller
Drop Dead
Dark Clouds
Major Pager
Kill Me
Charlie M
Growler

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