The Pigeon Detectives - 'This Is An Emergency'
There are two things I feel I need to make absolutely clear at the start of this review. One is that I always try to review singles with an open mind, regardless of my opinions of the artist and their previous work, and I always try not to let whatever personal prejudices I might have interfere with the job at hand (whether I'm always successful in that area is quite another matter entirely). The other is that I was assigned this review, rather than requesting it, lest anyone thinks I deliberately sought this one out in order to trash it.
So I'm not going to mention that I thought 'Take Her Back' was possibly the worst single of 2007 (um, except for that time right then) and focus on this single. Unfortunately, there really doesn't seem to be a lot to focus on. The opening minute of the song doesn't sound so much like a verse as it does someone running scales in a music practice room. The bridge shows some promise of musical variation and a kernel of a great idea in there somewhere, but it's all far too brief before it segues into a droning, go-nowhere chorus of endless repetition.
I spent the duration of the song hoping for some kind of curveball to show up, maybe in the middle eight or in the closing renditions of the chorus, but it all felt so utterly lacking in imagination or passion that I was continuously disappointed by it.
There's nothing especially wrong with it, I freely admit, but it all feels so by-numbers that I don't see why people would want to listen to this song when there are far better examples of the genre out there.
Download: Out now
CD Released: May 12th
www.thepigeondetectives.com
www.myspace.com/thepigeondetectives
(Steve Perkins)
PS: An alternative viewpoint of this song is supplied by the Winston's Zen blog, which accurately describe's the band's rise to fame thus far as a "slow-burning forest fire".
Comment number 1.
At 14:49 12th May 2008, Winston-Roache wrote:Wow! Mentioned by the BBC.
Thanks Steve. I don't know what to say....
Yes I do....
The Pigeons may not stretch any boundaries, or challenge the norms of any genre. But they do make solid, honest, fun indie tunes. There's nothing so bad about that.
And as a live act, they're a different prospect entirely. See Matt Bowmans recent injury at the BBC's very own Big Weekend for evidence. Or take a look at my review of their NME awards tour show at London's Astoria earlier this year.
https://winstonszen.blogspot.com/2008/03/gig-review-pigeon-detectives.html
Winston
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Comment number 2.
At 14:22 18th May 2008, sirgeordie wrote:The new album isn't all that bad to be honest, but I really don't like this song.
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