Spring Break
British band The Enemy falls short
Aaron Tessman
Issue date: 9/10/08 Section: Entertainment
09/10/08 - We'll Live and Die in These Towns, the inaugural album for The Enemy UK, is excellent- if you like repetitive songs, think English accents are hot, enjoy indistinguishable words and "would-be-Beatles-look-alikes."
Formed in 2006, the band has already produced several, No. 1 hits in England (how? I do not know). Consisting of three band members The Enemy features Tom Clarke on guitar with lead vocals, Andy Hopkins singing back-up and playing the bass-guitar, and Liam Watts attacking the drums.
I made mention of the Beatles earlier and, indeed, the members of the new band have the long locks and British accents that were characteristics of the broken up Beatles.
The drum line to many of The Enemy's songs, resembles The White Stripes' steadily pulsing beats, while the guitar-sound is more reminiscent of the 1960s -'70s Rolling Stones with few chords allowed to linger in the air.
After listening to the album (without being able to understand much of it), I played it again while looking at the lyrics. The first thing that struck me the second time around was the repetitiveness. "Aggro" is the first song on the record and has two verses and six bloody refrains! "Away From Home" repeats the words "away" and "oh" (48 times each, by my count). And so on.
The disc ends much the same way with the band singing, "happy birthday, happy birthday, happy birthday, Jane" for the last 30 seconds of the track, which is christened, "Happy Birthday Jane."
However, the CD does have its upsides...For instance, it is only a mere 45 minutes versus the possible 60-80 minutes of approximately 15 words used redundantly.
Another plus of this debut album is the music itself. The guitar riffs and drumming are halfway decent, though they are nothing compared to immortals such as Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton, John Bonham, Gene Kupa…
This is also the type of CD you can dance to. I found myself not listening to the words but focusing on the rhythms and melodies, finding my groove and playing the air guitar.
Anyone wishing to hear some of The Enemy's music without buying anything can browse YouTube or MySpace. Unfortunately (or perhaps, the word should be, "fortunately") they have no live shows scheduled, either in the U.S.A. or, across the pond. I give The Enemy UK an "A" for effort, "B-" for sound, and a "D" for originality.
Formed in 2006, the band has already produced several, No. 1 hits in England (how? I do not know). Consisting of three band members The Enemy features Tom Clarke on guitar with lead vocals, Andy Hopkins singing back-up and playing the bass-guitar, and Liam Watts attacking the drums.
I made mention of the Beatles earlier and, indeed, the members of the new band have the long locks and British accents that were characteristics of the broken up Beatles.
The drum line to many of The Enemy's songs, resembles The White Stripes' steadily pulsing beats, while the guitar-sound is more reminiscent of the 1960s -'70s Rolling Stones with few chords allowed to linger in the air.
After listening to the album (without being able to understand much of it), I played it again while looking at the lyrics. The first thing that struck me the second time around was the repetitiveness. "Aggro" is the first song on the record and has two verses and six bloody refrains! "Away From Home" repeats the words "away" and "oh" (48 times each, by my count). And so on.
The disc ends much the same way with the band singing, "happy birthday, happy birthday, happy birthday, Jane" for the last 30 seconds of the track, which is christened, "Happy Birthday Jane."
However, the CD does have its upsides...For instance, it is only a mere 45 minutes versus the possible 60-80 minutes of approximately 15 words used redundantly.
Another plus of this debut album is the music itself. The guitar riffs and drumming are halfway decent, though they are nothing compared to immortals such as Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton, John Bonham, Gene Kupa…
This is also the type of CD you can dance to. I found myself not listening to the words but focusing on the rhythms and melodies, finding my groove and playing the air guitar.
Anyone wishing to hear some of The Enemy's music without buying anything can browse YouTube or MySpace. Unfortunately (or perhaps, the word should be, "fortunately") they have no live shows scheduled, either in the U.S.A. or, across the pond. I give The Enemy UK an "A" for effort, "B-" for sound, and a "D" for originality.
