(Muso's Guide, July 3, 2009)
Album review
Launching a new business is the dream of hundreds of thousands across the globe.
As any fule kno, and as Sirallun would attest, the most important measure of any new business is to isolate a gap in the market and squeeze yourself into that niche. That way, you become that “thing” that so many people thought they couldn’t live without but couldn’t quite verbalise.
Sadly, there is no such stringency around the forming of a band. You can pretty much make any old noise and there’s airplay offered, because that’s what individual “taste” is about. Good news for Modern Skirts.
All Of Us In Our Night is their second studio album and the Athens, Georgia four-piece are awash with confidence and swagger throughout. Opener ‘Chanel’, starts up like Lee Marvin before kicking into a strummy American college rock paean to heroin “chic” featuring the line: “Cover up your tracks with a cardigan”.
The driving drums here hold the whole thing together, but the vocals fall on the wimpy side of rock. ‘Soft Pedals’ is tuneful and inoffensive, but the wistfulness of the meandering vocal starts to grate, all outsider posturing and musical wallpaper.
The high point musically is ‘Astronauts’, a melodic ‘I’m Only Sleeping’-style chugger, all stripped back guitars and vocal, before easing its way into a dainty-played pop suite of choral singing and listless wonderings: “I miss you, hope you stay”, the refrain goes, before the drums pick up a mere 2 minutes 9 seconds in, and a spin around a Beatles-esque musical world is the reward for the faithful.
Throughout All Of Us In Our Night, Modern Skirts are trying their hardest to woo. From the radio-friendly pop of ‘Eveready’ to the veritable lyrical nonsense of ‘Conversational’, this is best face forward, all “this is what you want” temptation.
But, even with the involvement of R.E.M.’s Mike Mills, there is something missing - some soul or heart, something real that Modern Skirts are offering above and beyond the usual. The best you can say about All Of Us In Our Night is the poppiness of tracks like ‘Motorcade’ - style over substance, but singalong enough for commercial FM.
Good news for Modern Skirts. Bad news for fans of good music.
