Wave Machines - Wave If You're Really There [Album]

Neapolitan Recordings

June 23, 2009, 04:16 PM

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'The day is wasted/If you're not wasted'. No, these aren't the opening lines from the new Babyshambles album, this is much more important than that. Right from the outset it is clear something special is going on here as the delicate tones entice you along on 'You Say The Stupidest Things' you find yourself being drawn into a world where melody, electronic beats and decent old fashioned musicianship sit easily alongside one-another.

By the time second track 'I Go I Go I Go' comes to an end you are won over and smiling - or just nodding along with your hand on your chin if you're all cool and shit. This is a tune that has been released twice now - all be it a remake second time round - and deserves to have gone top 10 both times (are there still charts?). It's a damn sight more catchy than swine flu, that's for sure.

Then 'Keep The Lights On' slinks into your head with its incredibly chilled summer beat and slick overlaid falsetto verses. By rights it should have you running like the Scissor Sisters are chasing, new single in hand, but doesn't. What you are doing is turning it up.

Straight into 'Punk Spirit' and they've let the guitar take the lead in a thoroughly charming, thoughtful slice of tuneful wonder. The ease at which Wave Machines seem to pull this song off is remanisant of a certain other Liverpudlian band. A highlight in an already glowing collection of songs.

The depth of the album is demonstrated to good effect on the title track 'Wave If You're Really There' with Wave Machines in a more vulnerable, perhaps even languid mood. It's a song to sit back and think about things to - and it doesn't really matter what you think about. That's the thing about Wave Machines - they aren't ramming anything down your throat, just creating a beautiful framework for your mind to go exploring in.

'The Line' sees the Machines back bubbling away again though. It's like one of the better Vampire Weekend numbers being attacked from the Animal Collective angle. There are also moments of euphoria on 'Carry Me Back To My Home' but the closer 'Dead Houses' has Wave Machines going back to where they started on first song 'You Say The Stupidest Things' with understated overlapping and slow building, uncluttered instrumentation. It's the perfect ending and I personally had no problem at all letting the entire album loop three times in a row.

Wave Machines are not relying as heavily on technology as say, Metronomy, so are free to write a straight forward four piece song like 'Carry Me Back To My Home' or 'Punk Spirit' and not have it sound out of place amongst the other more electronic tunes. What Wave Machines have managed to create in 'Wave If You're Really There' is an album full of great ideas that are never allowed to overshadow the all important melody. This is a highly accomplished piece of work and well deserves to be the hidden gem in your record collection.

We're waving, we're waving.

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