GutterPutter

For starters, We Were Promised Jetpacks are not the biggest name in Scotland’s underground scene, but neither were they the smallest. While they have yet to put out a record of considerable substance in their 12 years’ worth of experience, they did however put out some memorable singles like ‘Quiet Little Voice’ from These Four Walls. Influenced by their contemporaries like the Frightened Rabbits (from which I commend you to The Midnight Organ Fight) & Biffy Clyro, the band would try to pride itself on its song-writing… even if they might not be the most sophisticated. Drawing inspirations from the miserliness of their home country, We Were Promised Jetpacks seek to bring it into the proximity of our ears. Enjoy the View is the band’s latest release on September 10^th to which, for all their biggest endeavours, is just full-on derivative & void of character. There are little compliments that I can ascribe to this, much less call out anything that sticks out as being peculiar or innovative.

To start it all off, the production of the album is quite ‘interesting’ as to say. There’s a lot of reverberation like in ‘Not Me Anymore’ from the simple echo of the drumming to even the singing itself. Whatever intent it does at creating a spacious feel, it ends up coming off more as a dreary kind of dream pop. Maybe overproduced if that word fits in with what I’m saying. The mixing is rather strange as well as ‘Fat Chance’ sees singer Adam Thompson’s voice overtake the lead guitar so you might end up having to turn up your headphone a bit to hear it more clearly. The overall sound of the album is that much of it can end up blending into one another with some hushed background vocals peeping through for an annoying intent at evoking our interest. The lo-fi attempts at the vocal production, wherever or not it may have to be to capture the charm of The Strokes’ Julian Casablanca, falls flat as it only adds to how artificial the music feels. You could barely even hear the brief guitar solo (if that’s even one) at the end of ‘Don’t Hold Your Breath for Too Long’ as much of the instrumentals vary so much in its volume.

Even if we were to exclude the studio production, the whole album can be best described as being a complete cookie-cutter record of a project. Sean Smith’s bassline is groovy, yet it’s not utterly out of the world brilliant, the drumming follows your standard pattern, the guitars & the keyboard somehow manage to come off as being indistinguishable every now & then. Enjoy the View sounds ironic for its title as you could well picture a typical portrait of a landscape to accompany its tracks. ‘I Wish You Well’ is one that fits the description well for example as the upbeat playing is accompanied with an unconvincing doubling of the vocals. It attempts to pull off a sense of lyrical dissonance where the triumphant instrumental is against a desperate attempt to save a fleeting relationship. I’m sure that that attempt has never been made ‘new’ beforehand if there were any points to give out. ‘What I Know Now’ finds itself engulfed in its proposed melodrama on the other hand as the attempted take on the downbeat performance is outweighed by its sighing. The puppet strings are all there with no effort being put into trying to conceal it.

‘Nothing Ever Changes’ sees an attempt from We Were Promised Jetpacks to take themselves back to the past that is the garage rock/post-punk revival. The result of such being that it doesn’t provide a lot of satisfaction in its attempt to win anyone with a grating tsunami of shoegaze 3 minutes into it. The song’s bid at sentimentality over a desire to reconnect falls hollow & its attempt at stagecraft in its song-writing shows a lot more meandering thoughts in its execution. ‘If It Happens’ tries to play up the need to accept the past as it is & to look forward at the future, yet it once again falls into a pit of ironic lack of self-awareness given how samey it sounds to much of the whole record. It isn’t just the general composition that feels more alike to a typical indie pop band, even the lyrics reeks of insipidly alike to a déjà vu incident. ‘Would you want a piece of me/ If you could see what’s really happening on the inside?’ – ‘Blood, Sweat, Tears’ couldn’t get any more bankrupt of creative writing than these pre-chorus lines.

If there is one thing that I could give credit for, there are a few bright spots that can be best seen as a foreshadowing of the band members being poached for their skills. ‘All That Glittered’ suffers from the grating blockage that is the spacey production, yet the bassline sticks out well as it can swoon & pull you in to whatever is left of the aura that’s worth the excitement. The first half of ‘Just Don’t Think About It’ sees the dream pop phase paying off with only a twinkling guitar riff, the bittersweet delivery of the refrain & the radio-like stutter of the response. It’s not much, but less can indeed be more as the adage say. The introduction of the snare may end up swerve the song into being too dense for its effect by piling in more instruments, but the serenity is there while it lasts. Maybe it’s not too awful in the end.