Demos

Melody & Morestyles - Keep It Simple

Matt Churchill 04/07/2007

Rating: 4/5

Imagine a deserted bay, gentle breeze rippling the heat haze as you walk, sand between your toes and not a sound except that of the waves. Melody and Morestyles would provide the soundtrack to your stroll.

Taking snippets of Portishead and Massive Attack, the ethereal dream like daze that you fall into listening to Keep It Simple is so intense you could very well be up with the clouds. The sound is very organic, ranging from chilled jazz on 'Get It Down' with plodding upright bass and scat aplenty, to deliciously grimey hip hop on 'Step Back From One' and wave like soul of 'Beachin', which feels like its actually inhaling and exhaling.

With a voice that tingles the deepest parts of the soul, Melody has a skill for picking the right inflection to put onto a word to make each lyric a mini statement - there are no dead lines or fillers here. Her voice is soft but perfectly pitched and has the potential to be stretched much more, but had it been any different the feel of the record would have been lost.

The CD is available at www.myspace.com/melodylaffy for a fiver, which is money well spent when you consider the uniqueness of the album. With the indie scene becoming saturated with Libertines wannabes and Oasis never-gonnabes, it is not only refreshing, but also about time that music is re-discovered and explored with boundaries being pushed and rules broken. With this effort, Melody & Morestyles are having a go at doing just that and long may it continue.