Volcanic!
At school, volcanoes were of great wonderment of our young minds. With macabre tales of Pompeii city dwellers overcome by noxious gases and encased for eternity from the ash of Mount Vesuvius, they were the stuff of exotic foreign lands and of endless fascination. Now, they are the holiday ruining bastards, spewing forth from their cavernous bowels, plumes of ash which have caused no end of ructions for seemingly the whole world.
So where does this geological event leave the Sheffield/Leeds band Volcanoes?
Well, on the brink of releasing their ‘Sugar and Snarls EP’, the erruption of Eyjafjallajokull was probably something of a serendiptious occurance for the band. With everyone (insert search engine of choice)ing ‘Vocanoes’, it would seem only fair to assume that a fair few people stumbled over the ‘Volcanoes Band’, also. Serendipity is the best sense.
Exploding into proceedings, ‘Level Up’ is a pacy, beat driven indie pop number which sounds a little reminiscent of a punk infused Arctic Monekys or Hot Hot Heat. Bouncing around with effevescent energy and boasting great promise, it is a rather assured opener from the band. By comparisson, changing musical tack a little, ‘Fret in the Half Moon’ is a tightly wound, measured rat-at-at-tat and comes in complete contrast to the flayling energy of its predecessor, whilst ‘Pigs in Blankets’ jazzy tone and fingerclicks hints at The Zutons in both vocals and style.
With every track being so discernably different, it can often detract from what a band are trying to do and instead of appearing to be adept in their range it can seem a little disorientating for the ears. But, Volcanoes seem to have pulled it off here with their scatter gun approach to this EP. Nicely showcasing four assured tracks, it may be worth keeping an eye out for this band.