Demos

Los Salvadores - Wasps, Birds & Clients

Owain Paciuszko 17/09/2009

Rating: 4/5

Since their previous EP Los Salvadores have gone through a number of reshuffles due to changing drummers, acquiring a violinist and having a keyboard player quit. This EP representing a reinterpretation of some old tracks and a couple of new ones.

Opening track Empty Boxes puts the violin quite central in the mix, setting out their stall as a folk band with certain post-punk influences and, in lead singer G's vocal there's an air of young Paul Weller. Whilst on Leviathan they start to recall the gypsy-dance sound of Gogol Bordello, even down to the lyrics which insist 'And it doesn't have to be this way/There's something better we should start today.'

No Heroes particularly stands out cobbling together their slower and spritelier sound into something energetic and politicised as with the best of anti-folk. And it's a style that across this six-track Los Salvadores seem to have down pat, this record being a fine collection of mildly varied tunes seemingly designed for the jumping back room of a pleasingly grimy pub.

The suitably titled Drinking Song has a woozy swagger to it and sounds wistful and romantic in a drunken way. 'You better belive that we love you, we don't know you,' are the final words of this EP that is a marked style change from their earlier effort, and a step towards an intriguing and different path for this ever evolving band.