Sleep

AMG Review of Sleep

Jack Rabid
All Music Guide

And still they come. You can't even finish digesting the last crop of U.K. press-fed, milked, and built-up bands, and they're already pushing the latest fresh faces at you. It's like some nightmare assembly line from that I Love Lucy episode where Lucy can't keep up. How deep is your wallet? And your patience? But most of them -- Shed Seven aside -- have had at least something to offer. Marion benefit from Stephen Street's production; it's much more crisp than his recent Blur work, and he got them a support slot on Morrissey's U.K. tour. The scribes whisper "Smiths." They're wrong. With the exception of a singer that recalls the under-appreciated the Frank and Walters, mixed with the fortunately forgotten Gene Loves Jezebel, this band slots better with the Sleepers! and Echobellys of the world, as they favor chunky guitar pop on all four of the tracks on Sleep (Acoustic EP). They've got zip, youth, tight playing, and probably tight trousers. None of these songs come anywhere near justifying hype or "Hosannas!!" -- the hooks are too average, too pedestrian -- but if we mark this in a box called "potential" let's not file that box too far under anything where we can't find it. Not bad.