Bands of the Moment.

(Formerly Obscure Bands of the Indefinable period of time).

Seeing as this is never going to wash very well with Woolie (because he hates me and wants me to die), I thought I would risk everything and expose all of you… people (I think) to this wonderful sounding band I have just discovered.

Solar Powered People.

I first learnt of SPP when I watched a YouTube video about boring arseholes who had nothing better to do than meet up in San Diego or something and talk about themselves for a bit. Nevertheless, the only thing I found marginally interesting about the video was the soundtrack, this weird, ethereal, reverberating, echoey pool of guitar riffs and absolutely epic sounding choruses.

Wanting to know more, I perused their MySpace looking for clues. I then discovered they had an album out and it was available on iTunes. Naturally, I bought the thing, and listened.

The first thing going through my head was “Oh my fucking wow”.

There are very little vocals, SPP being a mainly instrumental band. Only a few tracks contained active vocal lines (such as “They’ll Never Say” and “Awhile”. However, on “Commercial Flight”, their almost stoned choir chimes in at what can only be described as the chorus. It’s somewhat euphoric in it’s nature, and it sounds suitable dreamy to send you to sleep and suitably heavy to wake you in the morning.

Their style is very evident throughout. SPP are rather fond of using tons of reverb for the lead parts (Guitars and Vocals), the bass and percussion seeming compressed rather than accentuated. However, this just emphasises the epic sound that they appear to be going for. However, sometimes this is overdone, and it really detracts from the intended effect. Nevertheless, it’s not too much of a problem.

On a first listen, I would give this album 8/10, my favourite track being “Hibernation” (which was the one used in the YouTube video). If you’ve got£7.11 to spare and fancy a listen, check out Solar Powered People on iTunes.