Sound Sxp Review 17/8

Summer Cats- Songs for Tuesdays

There are many species of cat but these Melbourne felines are less felis catus, the fluffy and loveable domestic moggie, and more felis silvestris, the spiky wildcat. Summer Cats clearly feel their nine lives are running out as they dash off 13 tunes in 32 minutes, only one of them breaking 3 minutes. It’s a torrent of smart and sassy indiepop, albeit pop lined with sharp teeth, starting and finishing in grunge style with a squall of guitars in overdrive and flourish of relentlessly pumped keyboards.

They’ve got Apples in Stereo’s sense of melody and the metronymic rhythms of Stereolab (especially the riotous ‘Lonely Planet’), not to mention outrageous humour and escapist fantasy in ‘San Tropez’ (“I could be punching Bobby Dylan circa 1963” and “hanging out with Rico/ making out with Nico”). The underlying tone, though, is of summer-fresh pop music: ‘Wild Rice’ (a slower version than previously available) is winsomely joyful with swooping melodies, ‘Let’s Go!’ challenges you to a race to the sweetshop, while the jangly chimes and “do-do-do” choruses of ‘Maybe Pile’ are a bittersweet plea from a hopeful suitor. There’s more energy here than a school playground before the Ritalin prescriptions are handed out; why it bears the title of “Songs for Tuesday” I don’t know, because the pop swagger of this album should make this a daily pleasure.

Article written by Ged M
Aug 17, 2009.
Sound Sxp - Alternative Music Blog