Clap Your Hands Say Yeah- Some Loud Thunder

Sat 13th Jan, 2007 in Music Reviews

One puzzle piece makes the puzzle. Without it there can be only disappointment: the old adage “so close yet so far” seems apt. For all that hard work, nothing. For the riddle that is Clap Your Hands Say Yeah the volatile element is singer-songwriter Alec Ounsworth’s voice.

For an extreme case, witness the group’s late withdrawal from last year’s Splendour in the Grass festival on account of, you guessed it, their frontman’s vocal chord problems. What’s that you say? Any band would cancel if their singer was unable to perform? That much is true, but have you heard the voice? If anything could make or break a band this is it.

CYHSY’s debut self-titled album of a couple of years ago was a fairly uneven – yet all the more charming – glimpse into a young indie band’s early recorded existence. All the traits were there – ragged charisma of Pavement (check!), a strong independent approach (check!), the danceability that the present music climate demanded (check! check! check!) – but there was one thing in particular which, while not necessarily adding to the band’s cool cred, gave the group the sense of identity truly needed to stand out from the crowd. Alec Ounsworth’s nasal intonations may have resembled the unholy love-child of David Byrne and Gordon Gano, but like every child, there was a bit of the unknown quantity about him.

Fast-forward to album number two, Some Loud Thunder: the voice remains, in fact much is as it was, only more consistent and, importantly, better. Lead single Satan Said Dance is as fine an introduction to the band as previous favourite Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth ever was. If it sounds cluttered, that’s because it is. If it sounds rushed, it is. As a single it is a glorified snowball of influences rolled into an almost cohesive whole. And that is what CYHSY do best: things aren’t perfect, but almost perfect, and therefore real. That and it’s mighty fun to scream “said dance!” on cue.

Some Loud Thunder starts curiously (and generally stays that way) with the title-track which is amongst the most intense songs the band have put to record. Yet – and this is really saying something – it is provided replete with the lowest of the lo-fi recording techniques. Ounsworth is near-on undecipherable and the song has me checking that the promo CD is working properly.

Next up are several mini epics which bring slightly more sense to proceedings – ‘Emily Jean Stock’, ‘Mama, Won’t You Keep Those Castles in the Sky & Burning’, ‘Love Song No.7’ and culminating in ‘Satan Said Dance’. These songs conjure an absurd carnival atmosphere, nothing new for the band but the dynamics, as well as Ounsworth’s acrobatic vocals, are much more refined. ‘Love Song No.7’ especially reveals a haunting side to the group.

Some Loud Thunder, if nothing else, dispels any lingering twee doubts about the band. The infectious enthusiasm remains but the joyful, childish tendencies have largely been washed away – for the better. Underwater (You and Me) is the closest the album gets to a novelty headbob but even then it is an unashamedly catchy tune. Second album syndrome is a phrase we hear all too often in the music world, but Clap Your Hands Say Yeah in 2007 have ridden the wave of hype one stop further than critics would have liked, and for that they should be well and truly clapped, yeah?