This is the second album by The Soft Hills I've had to review and this one is no less boring than the first, sadly.
Opening with Golden Hour a really bland boring song that sounds like a High Llamas cast off with a very disinterested sounding singer.
Black Flowers just meanders into the sort of drippiness they have made a specialty and not in a particularly endearing way.Road To The Sun, meanwhile, is so lame it's more like a journey to a grey sky of washed out torpor which is odd as the band's main man Garrett Hobba has moved from the rainy grey of Seattle to sunny Southern California, only to sound greyer than before.
The Fold is even more prostrate like he can't get off the couch to go outside, the poor love.
I Know the first time I heard this album I was zonked on Di-Hydrocodeine and this time on Co-Codamol but I think I'd be falling asleep to White Queen if I was on Crystal Meth. Damn it's sleepy and boring beyond belief and yes the bottle of opium Garrett Hobba says is needed to help listening to the album might help me into a coma at this point.
Blimey, finally they have woken up on How Can I Explain and it's the best thing on the album by far: a bit of a builder that is almost worth checking out.
Here It Comes should really just go away and Google other songs of the same name and hang it's head in shame at how sub-Radiohead at their most maudlin and meandering it is as it moulders away making me want to slap the band to wake them up!
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Blue Night is just soooo boring and laid back. I just want it to be over long before they start to play the piano motif that would work as a cool starting point for a jazz piece but is wasted in this context.
Belly Of A Whale is wimp personified and has none of the malice and passion of Gallows' Belly Of A Shark that is the best musical evocation I can think of for what it would be like to be in that predicament.
The album closes with Stairs and I almost hope they collapse if only to raise the song a bit even if it's the second best thing on this very mediocre album, having some cool noises to set off the generally bland beyond belief music. They manage a freak out that has all the hallmarks of Yo La Tengo at their tepid worst.
It doesn't matter much that they got Guy Massey to mix the album at Abbey Road as no matter how good he is it would be nigh on impossible to turn this into gold. On balance I preferred Chromatisms the other Soft Hills album I reviewed and I only gave that a 4 out of 10!!
Tapete Records online
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