You got to roll me...
Maybe it’s the fact that they hail from Dundee, maybe its their eagerness to be viewed as stupid jakies, maybe it was the mass hype behind them but The View never really caught a fire for this reviewer. Even seeing them early on, it seemed as though support act Pull Tiger Tail blew them off stage and that The View were a classic case of The Emperors New Clothes, or The Emperors Old Jeans if you will. So when ‘Temptation Dice’ came through for review, it was rather tempting to roll it and give the thumbs down but fair play to the band, they’ve upped their game this time around.
The track kicks off in a jangly upbeat mode, not dissimilar to something the Vampire Weekend tossed out a while back but as the song continues, it all falls into place. The melody, the ringing guitar at the end of each line, the upping in tempo and urgency and the pay off at the end of the verse all works. Heck, they’ve even thrown in some classy backing vocals and it appears as though the boys have grown up a bit and they sound all the better for it. Part of the annoyance about The View was ushered in by their record label yet again, going for the easy, early part of the year market to push the album out, in a move that seemed to be completely lacking in bottle. And lets face it, if theres a band out there who knows a thing or two about the bottle, it’ll be The View.
Rather than burying the lp at the start of the year, hoping the fanbase can be galvanised to buy in their droves when the market is pretty stagnant, there should have been more pressure behind this track as an attempt to show the progression in The View. It already looks as though The View have had their big moment of fame and the following years will see a decline in their fortune, but with proper backing and an inevitable big showing at T in the Park, there may be life in these pups yet.