Tapes'n'Tapes – 'The Loon' review
The Magic Numbers, Arctic Monkeys and Sandi Thom are all proud alumni, but the most recent graduates from the chatroom-blog-MySpace school of instant-fame PR are Tapes’n’Tapes, who, like their predecessors, have spread some good rumours on the web and are now enjoying the fruits of their labour.
While it is prudent to regard the hype with caution, the proof of whether this kind of band is any good is usually in the pudding. Strangely, however, The Loon doesn’t really offer any concrete answers either. It’s a record full of intelligent, witty musicianship with a college indie-geek slant, but it’s constantly wriggling out of answers, refusing to sit still, wearing a different influence on its sleeve with each track.
The principle fathers of this record are very clearly Pavement, with their looseness and off-balance slacker drawl obvious throughout, though across its 11 tracks TnT borrow from nearly every white guitar band since punk. Just Drums is redolent of Television, there’s a distinct whiff of Sonic Youth on Manitoba and even a touch of Mutations-era Beck on The Illiad.
As one might expect from the title, this record is decidedly off its trolley, and revels in its kookiness. The wilful eclecticism does provide a strange degree of consistency, but while most of the songs are excellent in isolation, the overall impression of The Loon is of pieces thrown together from 11 different jigsaws.
7/10
