A Close Shave
We first ran into This Is My Lawnmower at last years In The City, where they gave an interesting performance that gradually won us over without ever really blowing us away. This 3 track demo serves to give an insight to the Tameside 5 piece.
Title track Quagmire is desolate and hauntingly sparse but you’d have to concede that it works. Paul Rawsons vocals are a little reminiscent of Ian Curtis (but not to the point of plagiarism) but work well over the minimalist soundscape. Thankfully this is no shoe gazing love in though with guitars and synth working well together and some nice dynamics going on. The bass sounds a little flat but that’s down to the production more than the playing. After a few listens it begins to work its way into your head and much like the live performance you warm to it without ever really getting excited by it.
‘No Consequence’ is a strange offering, flattering to deceive with a much harder opening guitar riff it then takes you off on a bizarre journey of styles that you really couldn’t pin down no matter how hard you tried. This makes them sound terribly unfashionable and difficult to get into but at the same time that confusion holds the interest. The vocals are better here and the mid section is pretty impressive; again, after a few listens it starts to make sense and this is probably the best track on the EP.
‘Heat and Noises’ is different again, solid vocal harmonies with more of an electro feel overall. There is more of an emphasis on the vocals and the synth and whilst it’s relatively simple in structure and a little more familiar than the preceding tracks it still works.
The production isn’t the best with the vocals a little too much to the fore throughout but it’s certainly good enough to get a taste of what the band are all about. It’s confident, assured and where they really succeed is that they’ve produced something that sounds kind of familiar and yet you couldn’t really liken them to anyone in particular. No mean feat and when all is said & done we still maintain that This is My Lawnmower have something, we’re just not sure what it is …still!