The Walkmen - Pussy Cats Album Review

The Walkmen

Pussy Cats

Album Review

The Walkmen are easily the best band of their kind (and their kind includes The Strokes and The Rakes), and this album is a song-for-song cover of the 1974 Harry Nilsson album of the same name, which just happened to be produced by John Lennon. Covering that album (and staying true to its ramshackle sound and spirit), started off as a joke but eventually became a releasable album, only 5 months after their slightly-disappointing last record, A Hundred Miles Off. With songs that career all over the place, from Dylan's Subterranean Homesick Blues to Many Rivers To Cross, to Save The Last Dance, this is a pretty odd disc, but it has tanks full of charm - it has great intensity, sounds like great fun, and doesn't set out to impress anyone.

In easing off the cred pedal, it actually is a more endearing listen than Hundred Miles, and gets closer to their Bows + Arrows feel (which is a good place to be). Hard to say whether anyone who's not a fan of the band already should venture in, but there are few discs around with more organic great music, and certainly no bands who do what they do quite so well.

Rating 8/10

Mike Rea