The Pigeon Detectives -Up, Guards And At 'Em!

Wed 20th Jul, 2011 in Music Reviews

Not so long ago, The Pigeon Detectives looked to have stuffed it up; riding the sort of NME-fuelled hype that accompanied any Strokes soundalike in the mid-2000s, the Yorkshire five-piece promptly released a promising debut, and a rush-released follow-up with far more bile than charm – 2007’s Wait For Me and 2008’s Emergency respectively. Seemingly realising their misstep, The Pigeon Detectives took the better part of three years off to consider their options; return to everyday working life in Leeds, or get their shit together. Wisely, they decided on the latter course of action, before returning with Up, Guards And At ‘Em!.

Recorded in New York with Justin Gerrish, it sounds like the lessons learned during their long hiatus were as follows: a) pop is good. b) indie is good. c) The Strokes are very good d) we are British.

As a result of these realisations, The Pigeon Detectives have delivered an indie pop album that sounds a fair bit like The Strokes, if The Strokes were British. This is hardly surprising, but then again, surprising doesn’t sell albums, nor help you to charm your way into Kate Moss’ boudoir, and surprising certainly doesn’t make people want to ‘jump, chant and neck cider’ (which are all things that Musicohm thinks people will want to do whilst listening to The Pigeon Detectives). So, now that we know that it’s not surprising for an ‘indie’ band to make ‘indie’ music, is it any good?

Well, Up, Guards And At ‘Em! is a finely crafted album, pushing, pulling, swelling and drooping in all the right places. It also has, thanks to producer Gerrish, a diverse sonic palette. From a reasonably conventional drums-bass-two guitars-singer format, Gerrish sustains interest without resorting to synths, or a string section or the like. Drums go from big and boxy, to sharp and reverb-heavy, to bright and natural within a few tracks, and similar experimentation is happening on the other instruments as well. Likewise, the band do their bit, with intelligent arrangements that afford the various players their spotlight moments. The guitars, in particular, are full of invention, with the pneumatic ostinato riff that powers Need To Know This a particular highlight, regardless of its uncanny resemblance to The Strokes’ 12:51.

For all this though, one can’t quite shake the sense that The Pigeon Detectives make band-making-music-type music. You know, a bunch of guys, hey that sounds good, let’s put it with that, that guitar riff is boring, let’s turn up the bass, et cetera. It’s music that lacks a clear sense of purpose, of direction; no-one is trying to say anything, or achieve any sort of effect. The songs have lyrics, because songs have lyrics, and bands have singers.

Matt Bowman is, of course, the lead singer, and though he does all that this sort of music requires of it’s singers – provide hooks, a bit of attitude, a focal point – his voice is no more than serviceable, and his lyrics range from boilerplate to cringe-worthy. For instance, “all these things were done in secret”, is a meaningless but harmless non sequitur, but when chanted for a solid minute at the conclusion of the appropriately titled Done In Secret, it rises beyond the status of merely silly to that of a properly ludicrous lyric.

None of these misgivings, though, change the fact that Lost has a truly affecting, anthemic chorus, nor the fact that Through The Door would be a great song to jump, chant and neck cider to. It just means that there is nothing tying all the better moments together, it’s just a bunch of songs, and that makes the flat spots harder to endure.

Perhaps that’s the effect that the band had in mind when they conceived Up, Guards And At ‘Em!. Perhaps that’s more than enough to ask of an album.