Five O'Clock Heroes: Speak Your Language
Monday, 07 Jul 2008 10:37
Five O'Clock Heroes: Speak Your Language
Glaze Records, out now.
In a nutshell...
Next year's bargain-bin fodder
What's it all about?
Model-tinged, new wave-influenced second album from New York-based indie bores.
Who's it by
Fronted by Northampton-born Antony Ellis, the band have teamed up with man-jawed super model Agyness Deyn in order to give their follow up to Bend To The Breaks some novelty value.
As an example...
"Well there's nothing I truly desire/There's nothing that I really want/But the times I find myself in the fire/You choose between the right and the wrong." - Who
Likelihood of a trip to the Grammys
None, I'd hope. It'll probably end up in the odd CD collection, but then I'm led to believe some people are buying William Shatner albums in a non-ironic manner.
What the others say
"This isn't criticism for the sake of it, it's criticism asking them to change, or maybe stop, because this isn't fun for anyone." - NME
"Noxious reminders of every useless band you've witnessed briefly in some godforsaken dive, before exiting sharpish." - Times
So is it any good?
Ten years ago, I would have praised this album for the fact that it would just about fit on one side of a C-90. Sadly, the advent of mp3 players means this album is without any redeeming features whatsoever. If you've listened to Radio 1 for just half an hour at any point in the past five years you will have heard this sort of thing done better by at least three different bands.
Trite lyrics, a Stars In Their Eyes-style Elvis Costello tribute and a model singing on one song are never going to amount to anything other than a wholly unremarkable piece of work. Add to this the fact that no-one involved seems the slightest bit interested in proceedings and you have an album that is simply offensive in its tedium. Essentially I could have saved on the word count and just written "plodding" in large enough type to fill up this space. If readers had then hit themselves in the face as they read it, they would have been able experience the album at home without having to buy it. It's that bad.
Only one track will provoke any kind of response at all and that is Don't Say Don't. Sadly that's not because it's a diamond in the rough, rather that it sounds enough like a rubbish Police song to make the unfortunate listener sit up and say "this sounds like a rubbish Police song". Forgettable, self-indulgent tripe. You should be able to pick this up for £1.99 come Christmas.
1/10
Will Stevens
"Just how much does it sound the Police please? I like the Police, they invented reggae." - Jeff Capes
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