Hit and miss
The main thing you take away from this compilation is that Armadillo Records have an incredibly diverse roster; technically this is a very mixed bag, with some tracks extremely quiet and with quite poor production and others, reasonably produced but still a touch muffled, but way louder than the others which makes it awkward to listen to as you keep having to adjust the volume; that needs to be worked on before this is a comfortable listen.
A compilation album's diversity sometimes works in its favour, this very British affair may be a little too disparate though to really hook you in, with cheesy rock sitting next to quirky indie, screamo and 80s throw backs, it's hard to know which hat to wear when you hear it.
The first three tracks are hard work; the opener by Jonny Cola & The A-Grades sounds like David Bowie covering Pulp. Colour Change For Camouflage are a bizarre mix of Florence and the Machine style indie and rap; not very appetising unfortunately. Then we have cheesy crooning, pub rock style from Dead Sea Navigators, which also suffers from terrible production. Things start to pick up with Pocketbooks Belle and Sebastian-esque indie which is not bad and has the clearest and loudest production on the record.
Quadrilles are up next and are a highlight with their jagged alt-rock. Unfortunately this is followed by one of the lowest points with The Melting Ice Caps providing an 80s throwback with horrible synth. Our Lost Infantry also suffer from bad production values and it's too quiet, sounding like a demo, however this is one of the best tracks, it's rocky and interesting with duel vocals and shows promise. The last three tracks are a dark and moody hit of danceable rock from Silent Routine, which is a definite highlight, followed by some unfortunately cheesy American sounding rock from Unquiet Nights and the closer is by Calamateur and is poppy-rock trying for anthemic and almost getting there; it's a bit boy band but nicely emotive.
A seriously mismatched compilation which doesn't flow at all well, sounding like not a great deal of thought went into the placement of tracks. However if you can get past the awkward moments, it holds a few decent tunes.