Week 2 - 'Do You Like Rock Music?' by British Sea Power

Ok, those of you who have been paying attention will realise that I am a little behind on writing these reviews. Believe me this is not through not wanting to write, I just try and do too much at once. Anyway with all that in the past I shall try and get the ball rolling again (seeing as I have all the CDs) starting with British Sea Power.

Hopefully a band that are more recognised than Tom Baxter from last week, British Sea Power could almost be called respectable for the way that they have reached this third album without troubling the charts too much, whilst still being held with a high regard in the musical community. Currently a four-piece following the departure of Eamon Hamilton to Brakes, British Sea Power are definitely a band who have a tendency to live on the side of obscurity by playing tiny venues and carrying around branches. Despite this, the sound displayed in their early material such as 'Carrion' and 'Remember Me' screams out for fans of real tuneful music to buy them, but that success has yet to find them.

British Sea Power are one of those bands who you often hear mentioned on the indie grapevine as one that you should go and see live, and a few years back at that wonderful festival in Bramham I chose to do just that. In amongst all the foliage I found a band who were eager to perform and impress but at the same time doing all this with a smile on their faces. Their music, characterised by a full sound with striking guitar riffs would have been hard not to be impressed by. Shockingly since that day 'Do You Like Rock Music?' is the first of their material I have actually got my hands on, so when it came to choosing an album for this week, it was an easy choice to make.

The title of this album is particularly intriguing as regardless of whether you answer yes or no I'm not sure how you would know whether to buy the album or not. At the risk of being shot down, I would very much describe this album as one of two halves. From tracks one to six we have what I would have hoped for as the next steps for British Sea Power, continuing where they left off but also daring to write some striking songs that are musically brilliant and also completely unexpected. 'No Lucifer' is one song that falls into the unexpected category where singing what almost sounds like a love song to the devil combined with a chant enjoyed by many Burberry wearing football fans somehow ends up as the best song on the album. Sadly after track six the album just fades out with the brief exception of 'Atom'. 'A Trip Out' in particular is very lyrically poor and almost seems to just be included to make numbers up. All of this aside, existing Sea Power fans will no doubt enjoy the album if only for tracks such as 'Waving Flags' and the lengthy but enjoyable 'Lights Out For Darker Skies' and although this is not their best effort it is sure to keep them going towards further albums in the future.

The final question lies with how does it compare to 'Skybound' last week. Well as much as I'd like to love it simply for 'No Lucifer', it is by no means as complete an album as 'Skybound' and so, for now, 'Do You Like Rock Music?' goes to the bottom of the pile.

Week 0 - One Musical Idea

Last week, just before New Year I had an idea. I was thinking about the music from the last year (undoubtedly brought upon by Lee's notes) and I was struggling to remember what my musical highlights were, so this is what I am going to do about it. For every week of 2008 I intend to buy (not download!) an album released in that week, so by the end I will hopefully have seen the best of what the music industry has to offer this year. Inevitably I will buy some written by artists of which I have never heard, and probably will come across some that I buy that I do not like but I hope that this musical journey will be rewarding nonetheless.

So what is there to look forward to? New albums by bands such as The Subways and Los Campesinos! first spring to mind as well as offerings by The Futureheads and maybe even Franz or the Arctic Monkeys. As for the first few weeks I've pencilled in British Sea Power but also an album by Tom Baxter who I only came across in thinking about this project but I find (through Last.fm) may be similar to other artists I've bought before.

From what I can remember of last year the outstanding album was The Cribs' third offering. It rose above other challengers such as the Monkey's second and new ones from The Hives and Ash and while the Klaxons debut was an impressive musical feat, their failure to actually make a noise that was actually in tune took the edge off all but about three songs. How any of these will compare to any of the 2008 releases remains to be seen and that is what I hope to find out over the next 52 weeks.