When approaching a fusion based style, London’s Hats Off Gentlemen It’s Adequate are rarely anything less than interesting. Since their inception, the musical duo have painted an art rock canvas that’s blended prog, pop, funk and ambient textures in a way that – for the want of an easy descriptor – sometimes makes them sound like The Pineapple Thief jamming with the rhythm section of early 80s King Crimson. At other times, you might stumble upon the atmospheres of later Talk Talk, or swathes of guitar work tipping their more than adequate hat in the direction of ‘In Absentia’ era Porcupine Tree, but almost always with the Gentlemen’s own, slightly odd, twist. Simply put, you can rely on them to tease your ears with something pleasingly complex.
Category Archives: Album & EP Reviews
THE KILOGRAMS – The Kilograms EP
Bringing together the talents of The Mighty Mighty Bosstones’ Joe Gittleman (The Bass Fiddleman), Bouncing Souls man Michael McDermott, Secret Six’s J. Duckworth and Sammy Kay, The Kilograms is a supergroup of sorts. However, listeners shouldn’t necessarily expect this band to merely recycle the high octane punk and ska associated with their day jobs. Granted, you’ll find some familiar musical touchstones, but The Kilograms is very different beast.
QUIZ SHOW – Flotsam EP
On the surface, Quiz Show appears to be a rather inauspicious name, but on their debut album, this band immediately showed a vast amount of potential. Then again, that’s something that should be expected from a gathering that originally included Guided By Voices drummer Kevin March with Shudder To Think’s Jesse Krakow and Chris Matthews. Their first release created a great buzz around the still new band, and despite a line up change – Joe Billy replaces March, who was likely busy recording one of the year’s twenty GBV albums – the three tracks that make up this follow up EP make it very clear why.
SET FEUX – Set Feux
Set Feux features the talents of vocalist/keyboardist Diana Planche – a musician who first broke through as a member of Canadian indie pop band The Paint Movement – along with her husband Barzin, and wearenotwhoweare man Kevin Kralik. On this debut album, it often feels as if it’s Planche who’s in the driving seat, even if she doesn’t have complete artistic control. The material isn’t ever busy, but the very relaxed world that Set Feux creates, seemingly effortlessly, allows the album to be filled with all manner of fine music. In just nine songs, this self titled release takes in elements of light dream pop, mellow and almost soulful tunes, downtempo vibes that occasionally hint at the warm trip hop of Morcheeba, a pinch of light country and more besides. You might read the usual lazy claims that Kate Bush and Fleetwood Mac have been pivotal influences within the Set Feux sound, but if that’s the case, those never dominate the end result. The tunes here are far more lax, and even more distinctive in their own way.
PRAYING MANTIS – Defiance
With a run of enjoyable albums that began with 2015’s ‘Legacy’, Praying Mantis seemed to go from strength to strength over the following decade. Granted, a few of the tracks on that album and its successors (2018’s ‘Gravity’ and 2022’s ‘Katharsis’) were a little heavier sounding, but Chris and Tino Troy’s gifts for a strong melody continued to set the band apart from so many of the second tier acts associated with the New Wave of British Heavy Metal, and when dropping into numbers boasting more of an AOR/melodic rock hook, the band sounded as good as ever.