Better than the cynics would have you believe, but not deserving of the media furore either, Peace’s debut plants a solid foot in the indie world.
Riding a surf of promo hype into the bay of indie rock are Birmingham quartet Peace.
Their debut sounds eerily familiar, a re-tooling of the early-90s indie canon – but they deserve an audition before you write them off.
They’ve got the right ingredients: Singer Harry Koisser recalls Gaz Coombes’ early petulant wobble, and guitarist Douglas Castle can work up a suitably narcotic storm on demand.
And so we get washy guitars and whiney vocals on Follow Baby, while Waste Of Paint channels Happy Mondays guitar and druggy, love-from-the-doldrums optimism.
It’s not all looking back though, with Foals’ lightness of touch and pliable guitar lines evident on the uplifting Wraith, and Delicious laced with woodblock in a forward-looking track that’s vital and moody of verse, gutsy and groovy of chorus.
While there’s plenty of name-that-tune moments (The Cure and Bernard Butler are two more whose lawyers could be rolling up their sleeves), there might just be enough about Peace to avoid a war.
3 stars
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