Crash Harmony - Nobody Asked For This

 

New York's Crash Harmony finally record a debut album, over three decades on, and it is really good. Reviews have centred on comparisons to the mid to late 80s period of the band's heyday citing The Replacements and R.E.M and there are examples of both.

There is the scuzziness of The Replacements the odd time and the Indie part Jangle of R.E.M., but on a song like Writing You Out Of My Scene, the quartet get more 80s Rock, even Classic Rock. The Jangle when introduced works really well too.

German Camp gets closer to Garage Rock, yet Building Blocks is classic Soft Rock, Yacht Rock and Orange Background could be 70s Pop Rock. The excellent Floating's chorus would even make a great TV Comedy Theme Tune if this were the 90s. The slow riff is a killer on the verse too..

There is great Power Pop present also on the likes of Velour Goodness and Last Night's Girl, both coincidentally contain Jangled Riffs. Then there is the complete surprise of the closer, Cymbeline, and it's approaching 7 minutes.

It is a monster of a song that is so good that it flies by quickly. Very mid 70s Classic Rock with brooding slightly Psych Guitar and yet at times the song could appear on Fleetwood Mac's Tsk. It is out of kilter with what goes before, wonderfully so, but just adds to the variety on display.

It is not as though careers ended 30 years ago. Dave Derby is the kingpin of the splendid Gramercy Arms and Mike Potenza is in my beloved Anderson Council. Reviewers will have you believe that this is all late 80s influenced, it isn't, it showcases much more than that and does it really really well.

You can listen to and buy the album here. It is available on Vinyl and as a download.

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