Endearingly chaotic garagey guitars, low-fi production and sumptuous vocals delivering bittersweet lyrics herald in the new single from Fields, who are shaping up to be one of the year's more interesting new bands.
Produced by Michael Beinhorn (Soundgarden, Marilyn Manson), If You Fail We All Fail manages to sound incredibly sophisticated and knocked-together-on-Argos-guitars all at once, with ideas above its station and ambitions above its budget except, of course, with the major label moolah of Atlantic records lurking not too far in the background it's probably taken a lot of money to make them sound this raw.
It's money well spent, with Nick Peill's satin smooth vocals providing the perfect complement to the sandpaper production. They seem to have forgotten about trying to be Sigur Ros as well which, nice as it was, is probably a good thing.
The single is quite a departure from the 4 From The Village EP released earlier this year - more urban, in many ways, lacking both the country tinges of Songs For The Fields and the outright surf pop psychedlia of the EP, a lost Pebble rather than a lost Nugget. It's interesting though, brave and ambitious and it's good to see that they're not afraid to experiment long before they release their first album. Catch them on tour now, sharing the MTV-endorsed spotlight with Wolfmother, ˇForward, Russia! and The Maccabees.
