The Pigeon Detectives - 'Up, Guards And At 'Em!' (Dance To The Radio) Released: 04/04/11

The Pigeon Detectives graduated from 2007’s festival season with their mopheads held high. It was a year where indie was dominated by sweaty rock’n’roll, whilst The Enemy and The Fratellis were likewise tearing down crowds with chopping guitars and air punching sing-alongs, The Pigeon Detectives held their own. Matt Bowman’s curly fro; rockstar amp jumps and his mid-performance water fights with an Evian bottle provided the perfect festival package, where catchy choruses and simplicity were king. The bands 2007 release, ‘Wait For Me’ had indisputably catchy songs and was saturated with indie floor-fillers, but its successor, ‘Emergency,’ lacked some of their firstborn’s charm. All this was all forgivable mind, because it was produced and released so abruptly that fans accepted it wouldn’t be as nurtured and polished as their debut. However, after a three year sabbatical, ‘Up, Guards And At ‘Em!’ has no such excuses to fall back on.

The opener ‘She Wants Me’ sets off a disappointing start. Its kick drum and tambourine beat is by no means awful, yet somehow doesn’t create the desired effect of being an addictive festival chant-along record. The Pigeon Detectives are never going to win Ivor Novello’s for most inventive and poetical lyrics, and fans loved them for it. Hoping for Alex Turner-esque colloquial catchiness instead, they created something basic but exciting. Third time round however, the lyric choices feel worn and lack any sort of hook.

‘Lost’ begins a lot more promisingly, enriched with a somewhat familiar and rather bubbly Biffy Clyro sound, its enjoyable indie-by-numbers. Whereas the follow on ‘What Can I Say’ attacks wearily, the uncharacteristic lyrical ambiguity actually results in the song saying nothing. Despite the raucous guitar riff’s best effort, it feels more like a filler track and not the dancefloor kind.

‘Done In Secret’ and ‘What You Gonna Do?’ are standard Pigeon Detectives album tracks, not quite reaching the heights of ‘I Found Out’ but marginally worthy of their listen all the same. Continuing this hit and miss fashion is ‘Turn Out The Lights,’ arguably the albums lowest point, it's a token ballad that’s tedious repetition is both uncreative and completely forgettable. Ironically, the album’s weakest link is succeeded by its strongest, ‘Through The Door,’ is the perfect indie-hour party song, with “I wanna dance with you but my hands are on fire” and similar youthful lust. The final track is possibly their most mature and output to date. A dreamy Hawaiian feel, ‘I Don’t Know You’ demonstrates previously unseen levels of restraint and eloquence, both lyrically and musically. The obscure holiday backing track, keyboard and guitar combination seem to work and it’s a real shame there aren’t more tracks on the record like it.

In all fairness, ‘Up, Guards And At 'Em!’ is in some ways exactly what you’d expect from The Pigeon Detectives. They seem to have opted for the same if it ain't broke, don’t fix it policy we’ve seen before and ‘Emergency’ was a sure fire warning that they weren’t ever going to walk down any experimental avenue on us. Whilst sticking to your guns is an admirable trait, this formula is hardly award-winning and five years on from their debut, many original fans will have out-grown the majority of their output. The unpolished and rustic charm The Pigeon Detectives once had seems to have run out and been replaced by a sense of musical laziness. Bowmen and Co. have made a fatal error if they think repeating the phrase “Got at it completely!” three times is going to create the same all-crowd chanting they're used to this festival season.