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| It has long been a problem with this humble website of ours that we review the CDs we are sent and often overlook the bands we cherish the most. For me, the most regrettable casualty so far of this rather ill-thought out approach has been the remarkable debut album by Champion Kickboxer. |
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Released sometime around June this year on Sheffield label Thee SPC, Perforations has been sadly overlooked when by rights it should be being heralded as one of the year’s most accomplished and spell-binding records. Certainly, if I get my way, it will be topping TinyVoices’ own end-of-year round up.
Perforations is a beguiling, oddly melancholic and charming indie pop album that pays no regard to the conventions of its genre, past or present. It is so intricately composed and arranged that you suspect each song has been pieced together one note at a time. The production is basic but perfectly judged, with a home-grown, warts-and-all approach that gives the band plenty of room to manoeuvre. Constantly inventive, the Sheffield four-piece applies an idiosyncratic musicianship to a wide range of sounds, from vintage guitars and keyboards to chamber vocals, hand claps and assorted percussionary peculiarities (the ‘screwdriver and saucepan’ combo is of particular note).
The result is an album that may well not be everyone’s cup of tea, as it’s an unpredictable and often downbeat affair, but it can also be joyful in places, and those who take to it will find it a fascinating and often heartbreakingly beautiful set of songs. Singer Tom Bates’ deadpan ruminations are wrapped in a blanket of childlike wide-eyed wonder, but balanced with a sober intelligence and wit that craftily sidestep any cuteness. And despite never pulling a single ‘rock’ move - the guitars are never thrashed or even more than mildly distorted, and the drums rarely, if ever, slip into a conventional beat - the songs occasionally bubble over into taut, wild-eyed bursts of catharsis that are at some points almost chilling (particularly the sinister ‘Language’, with a chorus of yelps evoking an image of the Beach Boys being poked with hot knives).
But reference points are not easy to come by, and they inevitably fail to do justice to a style that sounds as if it was created in vacuum, untouched by anything to come before it. At best you could say the band ploughs a similar furrow to experimental indie acts like the Super Furry Animals and Dawn of the Replicants, while the complex vocal harmonies elicit a mild comparison to the Futureheads and Field Music.
I’ve maintained for quite some time now that Champion Kickboxer are among the best, if not the best, of Britain’s bands. I really should have reviewed this album six months ago, but it’s not too late to buy it. I really recommend that you do. |
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| Tom Pegg - 10/10 |
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Name:
Marcus Parcus Sitting in an office
| Date:
20/11/06 | Reply
Nicely said...wish more people could get to hear them... someone should give Champion Kickboxer (or their label) a big kick up the rear to get them to the fore.
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Name:
Robert Dylan
| Date:
05/06/07 | Reply
I also think they're great
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