A healthy fusion
An opening track called ‘Doomsday’ seemed to set another depressing tone for Elvis Perkins and his ‘The Doomsday EP’ which came after the morose ‘Ash Wednesday’ album. However, these initial concerns were blown away by an opening track which was almost jovial, at times bringing to mind the Beach Boys version of ‘Sloop John B’. That certainly wasn’t expected but the mixture of bright and breezy folk worked well with the darker croak of Perkins voice with the end result being a song that positively fizzled.
The traditional blends well with the original, a collective sound coming through from all the tracks on show with the lilting zombie from ‘Stay Zombie Stay’ pleasing as well as being reminiscent of ‘Tender’ by Blur, which owed a lot to gospel music. The fusion of different genres is a trait worked well by Perkins with ‘Stop Drop Rock and Roll’ also being a spunky mix of blues, rock and laid-back vibes.
The release was topped by a slower version of the opening track, imaginatively entitled, ‘Slow Doomsday’. What this track may lose in originality, it manages to showcase the more plaintiff sound of Perkins and there is nothing like leaving the listener on a low note. However, a low note doesn’t necessarily equal a bad note so don’t make this a reason to not check it out.
E.P.s are often overlooked nowadays but given the importance of downloading, it should be a great tool for many labels and acts. How many albums do you love and of them, how many of them do you love every track? Price is an issue but the amount of filler tracks on albums is what drives people to download individual songs as opposed to full albums so if you only have five or six good songs on a record, here is a novel idea, only download those songs.
The download capabilities means that it is so much more cost effective to bundle these songs together and get them out to the general public. Elvis Perkins may just be a recipient of the more canny music shopper.