Night Noise Team - Slow Release

In all of their promotional materials, Night Noise Team like to tell us that they are a band with a huge number of influences, with their members hailing from all over the place. Unfortunately, this has led to a bit of a scatter-brained effort, and Slow Release is just a little bit all over the place. For the most part, in a bad way.

You have songs which attempt to combine sounds from the likes of The Killers and Franz Ferdinand, such as the melodramatic album opener The Gift. Later they take you into the realms of disco with Redemption 81, and the frankly odd Burning. This song goes from a slow burning verse into the funky disco chorus; it's a bit like flicking between channels to the point of nausea. All this within one song. Elsewhere, Menolick is a fast paced sub-The Bravery number. It's all fairly underwhelming, but you have to give the band credit for putting their fingers in so many pies, and dipping their toes into so many seas.

As if that wasn't enough, the album features some moments of Britpop apery. Doors Are Closed in places sounds like Suede but never comes close to matching that bands own original and grand vision. Unfortunately, Night Noise Team are too busy trying to crowbar as many of their ideas and influences into all their songs all the time that the 36 minute album becomes exhausting. Obviously credit for trying, but this album just falls short on all fronts.

Ben Walton