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It’s not a great time to be a new, young indie band. These days the guitar/bass/drums/vocals formula, sometimes with a splash of keys, is seen as tired and unoriginal, and unless your band possesses at least one arcane instrument that nobody’s ever heard of before, you’re probably considered not worth listening to.
So when The Drums made all those 2010 ‘ones to watch’ lists back at the start of the year, was it just a case of lazy old hacks identifying a band that most resembled the formula they were long used to, or did they really have something different and interesting to offer?
The release of their self-titled debut album gives the rest of us a chance to decide for ourselves, and early indications are that there may be some substance to the hype. Not that the material is necessarily groundbreaking - you’re more likely to be transported back to the early 80s new wave of Soft Cell and The Cure than to feel like you’re listening to the sound of the future - but at the very least, The Drums have a well-developed sense of their own identity, one that they are able to channel through their material.
Former single ‘Best Friend’ is the ideal opener, featuring the simplest of guitar and bass lines and a lyrical bridge of ‘How will I survive?’ which, 25 years ago, would have been sung by men in baggy jumpers with dyed black, back-combed hair, and would have been considered a perfect nugget of an indie pop hit.
‘Let’s Go Surfing’ proves it’s now impossible to write a surf song without reverting to the 8/4 time signature of The Beach Boys’ original, though here The Drums include a Peter, Bjorn and John-style whistled intro and a gentle wash of backing vocals in order to claim it as their own. The vocal harmonic colourwash is used to even greater effect on ‘Book Of Stories’, featuring a verse which owes more to The Beach Boys than just subject matter, but which has a chorus as strong as anything else on the record.
From there, the standard remains consistent, though variation is minimal.
'Down By The Water’ is a high school doo wop ballad that could have replaced ‘Earth Angel’ in that scene from Back To The Future, while ‘I’ll Never Drop My Sword’ has the only discernible change in instrumentation on the album, with an acoustic guitar intro which continues to amble along behind the music for the rest of the track. There are hooks and melody aplenty, which should be enough to ensure swathes of devoted teenagers claiming The Drums as their very own.
For those slightly longer in the tooth, this debut provokes two thoughts; firstly, that the early 80s were long enough ago, and the new wave sound a rich enough seam, that there’s no reason it shouldn’t be revived again now. And secondly, that if this sound is good enough to get excited about second time around, how lucky they were 30 years ago who listened for the first time, knowing its like had never been heard before.
