Dauphin

Cancel the Astronauts finally release their debut album on September 17. I’ve been listening for a while and I like it quite a lot. I’ve covered them before, here.

Starting with the explosively loud introduction of the title track, Animal Love Match does away with mopey lo-fi nonsense and jumps happily into jolly indie pop. That’s not to say it’s without emotional pull – the opposite, in fact, because the lead vocalist seems to be excellent at conveying pathos through his voice – but it’s a fun record, a fast record, the sort of record that you could dance to (though I wouldn’t know because I never dance. I am dead inside).

Flying through second track Seven Vices to their single Intervention, Love Match barely stops to catch its breath on Love Backwards before the brooding, rocky Making Dynamite.

After the pleasant lull of Spaces the record moves onto the more upbeat Promises of Strangers; this segues into I See, Uh Huh and While I Was Sleeping. About this point I started to make comparisons with older bands – on that track in particular it felt like a marriage between Blondie and James, though I’m not sure that’s quite what they’re aiming for.

Before the end of the album, Catch You If I Can slows the pace with nice piano emphasis and builds up for the final bow on I Sold My Soul (And This Is All I Got), a joyful and bouncy bookend to the album. With that jangly guitar melody I think this was my pick from the whole album.

If you pre-order the album from this link, you get goodies!