Heady mix
22's mix of great melodic vocals, meaty riffs and drums and quirky time signatures makes for a pretty heady math-pop-rock combination. Opener 'Plastik' melds all this into a jagged, sing along beast with funky bass and some really heavy duty riffage thrown in for good measure, it's seriously addictive.
Funky bass is in evidence again on 'Oxygen' along with some slinky keys and a super poppy tune, this one is slightly reminiscent of Muse at times but those intensely jagged and mathy guitars keep this track (and the rest of the EP come to that) from being both too pop and too reminiscent of anyone else, you just get odd snatches of familiarity which are soon pulled away. The gloriously nasty, off kilter riffs and eerie little noises in the last minute of this tune are brilliant and propel it into something far more interesting.
As well as the nasty jaggedness, the vocals on this record set the band apart from their contemporaries- slick, versatile and with a huge range, they are actually pretty stunning– you really wouldn't think, taking them out of context that they would fit here, (perhaps on a mainstream pop/r n b track?) but in conjunction with everything else going on 22 manage to pull it off in style and create some really huge, anthemic tunes.