Demos

SomaHigh - Something About You

Owain Paciuszko 18/10/2010

Rating: 3/5

A jaunty, lively start to this sophomore ep from Southampton's SomaHigh gives way to a peculiar mesh of rock-stylings that recalls Muse wrestling with contemporary Foo Fighters-isms, Sean Strugnell seems to be channeling Graham Coxon impersonating Josh Homme his delivery working best on the title track's choruses contrasting a pensive lyric against the frantic hammering of Ryan Smith's drumming.

These influences fade into Flashback Tuesday, which has an air of surf-rock to it and Strugnell's sneer drifts towards The Bluetones on the track's verses. There's some wonderful wobbly synth work going on in the background of the choruses, and a cheeky stop-start ending that almost lead me in my haste to write; "Track three sounds exactly like track two." Saying that track three (aka We Don't Want This) picks up the baton and runs with it down a track that echoes the Arctic Monkeys a their most posturing on the verses, with short-stunted verses barking out the title.

There's so much firecracker energy in these three tracks that the band never really give you anything more than 'the hits', unlike, say The Hives in their early days, these short sharp tracks all blend a little too closely and this ep feels more like a single. There's nothing particularly bad about SomaHigh and the music they make, it's just on this little tease it's kind of hard to really bring anything else away from the experience than fleeting enjoyment.