I never know what I should do.
Can I leave it up to you?
Can I leave it up to you?
So, I’m still kind of exploring my rediscovery of the EP as an art form by trolling old issues of Rolling Stone for their EP reviews, which they did occasionally. This one is extremely short, just a hair under ten minutes, which is about the bottom length for an EP; any shorter and you’re just a single with an extra song. But the three songs here, Unconditional, No Brakes & Out of Line, are really just brilliant. This was The Bravery’s debut; their debut LP would come out in 2005. The songs here have this really wonderful mix of influences. There’s a U2 to their high-pitched guitars, something of the Editors or the Killers in the vocals and a great catchy Franz Ferdinand-esque spark to their music. It’s really, really catchy, very fast-paced and kind of perfect modern Britpop, each song a little “three minutes and change” masterpiece. The songs don’t really sound exactly alike though, which is good. Out of Line has a great, fuzzy electronic beat and none of the chiming guitars that really define the sound of the title track. And the final minute or so of No Brakes is absolutely anthemic. I may need to get into more of this group’s stuff. Whether I do or not, I’m super glad I checked out this EP; it’s only about ten minutes, but it’s a brilliantly consistent little album, just three near-perfect songs adding up to a great listen and a great calling card for the band. 4 stars.
tl;dr – Britpop group’s debut is a very brief three song EP, but every song on it is catchy, up-tempo and memorable. 4 stars.