We Know Why The Earth Moves is the debut album from Perth’s The Slow Beings, a band born of underground bands The Bamboos, The Rainyard, The Healers and Header. Like many of WA’s indie rock bands, the emphasis on The Slow Being’s sound is on melody and beauty rather than heavy rock and glitz, like the Shins and the Panics before them. That’s all well and good but the album – while proving the Slow Beings are talented and musically adept – often drags in its quest to blend sweet indie pop and the no-nonsense combination of guitar, bass and drums.

Nil By Rote will appeal to Panics fans and the organ and swelling guitars are used to create a sound that could be soothing or sleep-inducing depending on one’s mood, contrasting with Craig Hallsworth’s vocals, which are slightly more garage-y than James Mercer’s (The Shins). Yoshkar-ola song is straightforward and despondent folk-pop that speaks to those who have recently been dumped but don’t want to listen to emo. (Let’s) Get (Married) starts off with fuzzy guitar, and while slow like many of the other songs on the album, it is also dark and brooding. It could have been inspired by Neil Young’s Hey Hey, My My, with more folk thrown in.
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Despite not being acoustic, The Happy Few would have felt in place on the Foo Fighters’ In Your Honor’s acoustic bonus CD. The title track, We Know Why The Earth Moves is brimming with ‘60s pop, akin to early Beatles. That’s not a bad thing and they’re hardly the only band to do it nowadays.

The high point of the album, and the song everyone raves about, is I Waste The Sea. Its mash of Weezer-style rock and non nonsensical lyrics nod to At The Drive In, before becoming psychedelic half-way through. The boys then have a jam session towards the end, making I Waste the Sea the longest song on the album – but thankfully not Peter Frampton-13-minutes-long.

We Know Why The Earth Moves risks being labelled boring by those who are not in the mood for slow songs, but will please those who like indie pop-rock blends without the electro-frills that have adorned much of the scene lately. It dishes up folk and garage in just-palatable sized pieces. They’re a band with diverse influences that could handle some sonic experimentation in future albums.

We Know Why The Earth Moves is available now from Hidden Shoal Recordings.