By: Chris Ball
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Released on May 13, 2016 via Partisan
It’s a big moment for Leeds quintet Eagulls. Not only does this month see the release of sophomore album Ullages on Partisan records, but it signifies the moment when they really have to back up all the hype they’ve been generating since their formation in 2010. I think of Eagulls as a classic NME ‘buzz’ band – you know the type: more feted for what they say and how they look in a nice anorak than for any musical prowess. We’ve had the classic splenetic year zero ‘fuck every other band‘ pronouncements, the edgy video, the patronage of Steve Lamacq and The Letterman Show appearance. Nearly every box ticked.
The debut album was okay, being an itchy and scratchy amalgam of Joy Division, The Clash and early Cure. It sounded like it had been recorded round the back of a studio, by the bins. Hardly revelatory, but nothing unforgivable on it. Now, in a move similar, but more remarkable, to when the Manics went and produced a polished stadium metal album for their follow up to Generation Terrorists, Eagulls have moved entirely away from confrontational post punk racket to fully fledged Cure worship, but without the playfulness or gothic, fairytale trappings.
Opening track, ‘Heads or Tails’, has a cascading guitar intro redolent of classic Stone Roses, the band announcing their intention to one day fill stadiums, (you can imagine them sauntering out to it, all gobby and louche) , but it never quite moves out from under the shuffling rhythm and into the stride of a proper anthem. Next up, ‘Euphoria’ has a big mass appeal friendly build, with pounding drums and melodies soaring up and out towards the skies, however there is an over-arching dourness to vocalist George Mitchell’s delivery that blankets this and other songs in an air of crotchety complaint. Worst of all is ‘My Life In Rewind’ which sounds a lot like Shed Seven – that’s worth pondering for a moment, from a band who made some pretty snotty remarks about the stylistic shortcomings of their contemporaries.
Eagulls have at least succeeded in creating big, tremulous and moody post punk soundscapes, with enough reverb and deep bass riffs to confuse nearby whales, and musically at times it sounds impressive. There’s clearly a desire to recreate the unearthly gothic textures of The Cure and classic 4AD bands, and they’ve certainly got that down pat, but it’s too pat to really offer much evidence that they have any new ideas themselves. The inherent miserablism of the band means that despite all the gauzy dreaminess of the music the songs remain largely earthbound and stubbornly unlovable.
The best songs are the pacier, more muscular numbers such as Lemontrees, Blume and Skipping, on which the bands growing sophistication and rhythmic power marries the Cure-isms to a punk energy, similar to The Horrors or Dinosaur Jr’s retooling of Cure song ‘Just Like Heaven’.
The fact that these three songs all appear in a run together means that every listen encourages you to go back and re-evaluate the rest of the album, but even after multiple plays the remainder is merely frustratingly derivative and borderline irritating… That’s another box ticked.
