Photo:
One of the few things to cheer us at the start of the year, as January drags on and the credit card bills fly in, are the annual tips, the bands that will change your life! 2007 being no different, among those recommended to us by the supposed experts are Cold War Kids, a Californian quartet that have come to attention following excessive blogging, word-of-mouth recommendations and comparisons with equally-vaunted bands such as Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! and Tapes 'n Tapes. Such comparisons do have some founding to them - levels of hype certainly have been high for all three acts - but the thing that sets Cold War Kids apart is vocalist Nathan Willett, whose voice evokes the primeval howl of Jack White in its soulful retrospection.
Nowhere is that more apparent than on opening track 'We Used To Vacation', which is based around the sort of piano hook the White Stripes have used countless times. An impressive introduction, it is followed by 'Hang Me Out To Dry', a bass-driven new waver that sounds like The Rapture with a hangover, plodding and clunking in a desperate effort to find the funk to match Willett's plaintive vocals. Next up is the more reflective 'Tell Me In The Morning', a potential future single that is perhaps the standout track on 'Robbers & Cowards'. CWK go back to the blues during the likes of 'Hospital Beds', 'Hair Down' (which also borrows from The Flaming Lips) and 'Saint John'. These jangly country and western strings are in direct contrast to the more eastern-flavoured 'Passing The Hat', while 'Robbers' has an almost gospel quality to it.
There is certainly something of a heady brew of influences that make up 'Robbers & Cowards', with traces of CYHSY, The Strokes, our man Jack and even Jeff Buckley meaning no track sounds the same. 'God, Make Up Your Mind' has a smoky jazz feel to it, while closer 'Robidoux' manages to sound like Arcade Fire, another derivatively original act from across the Atlantic. Though an engaging listen, there is certainly something unnerving about this album, with the topics discussed (among them robbers, rapists and religion - nice) hardly defining them as your typical Californian band (no bad thing).
It matters little though, as this album could still be a firm favourite come December.
