Rather than the work of ironic hipsters or bandwagon jumpers, the duo of Sean Hewson (of Eternal) and Chrisian Savill (of Slowdive) is the real deal. Given Savill’s genre-defining guitar sound the two bring a classical sense of pop know-how and the ability to craft undeniably catchy songs that could be from another era, but make for irresistable listens in 2010.
The moment I heard the opening moments of "Bored Beyond Oblivion," I knew I was in for something good: a stiff drum machine beat, treated vocals, and chugging distorted guitar. It called to mind the Jesus and Mary Chain of the later '80s, and a little bit of A Place To Bury Strangers, but with the focus much more on creating catchy pop rather than volume levels that can do structural damage. There's very few combinations of sounds that I find as good as an unhinged guitar and a dated drum machine, so hearing them here brought an immediate smile to my face. "Silver Knife" has a similar tact, hiding gentle melodies under the brittle distorted guitars augmented by some extremely subtle keyboard playing.
Good old fashion synth pop makes an appearance as well: "Down, Down, Down" has chintzy keyboards and electric pianos taking the lead, burying the guitar low in the mix as a textural element and even tossing in some synth strings. It's just the right mix of schmaltz and compelling to keep it stuck in the head for hours afterward. The stripped down structure of "Everyone Is A Ghost" slows things down: its combination of arpeggiated bass synth, analog leads, and an ancient drum machine rhythm (yay for 808 handclaps!) isn’t far removed from the earliest of synth pop. "Fall" and "The World Collapsed" modernizes the electro pop a bit, with the lush (and sometimes cheesy) synth arrangements channeling just a bit of Erasure.
A few of the tracks strip away the electronics almost entirely, instead opting for laconic acoustic pop. Both "How the Dead Live" and "A Place in the Mountains" are just vocals and acoustic guitar, and "In The Morning" mixes in drums, giving it more of a 1990s alternative feel than the decade prior exercises around it, but is just as catchy and endearing as the rest. Personally I think "In The Morning" is the best of the acoustic-focused trilogy, with the other two just feeling too sparse, and doesn't allow Savill's trademark hazy guitar sound to appear. Oddly enough, the sore thumb on the disc, "Help Me Make It Right" features synths that are much more modern in sound, distortion on the drum machine and heavily vocoded voices that sound far less conventional than the rest, is probably my least favorite track here. Not that it isn’t good, it just feels more experimental in an otherwise catchy, earworm laced disc.
There is definitely an undercurrent of nostalgia, but not one that’s satisfied to simply mine the same sounds as before, but instead relocate them to the present day to create an album worthy of the band's legacy. It is unfortunate that on their fourth album and tenth year, they haven't reached the level of notoriety that other similar projects have managed to garner. Perhaps this will be the breakthrough release for Monster Movie...it is certainly strong enough to be.
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