Tuesday 29 July 2008

Wild Beasts - Limbo, Panto


I saw Wild Beasts once and to say I wasn’t impressed is quite an understatement, quite a time later I find myself listening to Wild Beasts. I wasn’t going to even listen to ‘Limbo, Panto’ because of my experience with them that I had before. However every one deserves a second chance right? I mean when I saw them live it could’ve been one of the worse days of their lives. Everything could’ve been going wrong that day so a second chance was definitely deserved.

Thankfully I did give the band a second chance because ‘Limbo, Panto’ is a pretty special record in today’s climate of bands. There are far too many bands like One Night Only, the Pigeon Detectives, The Metros etc etc etc. Not enough bands like Wild Beasts who are definitely not like the current crop of crap that is out there.

Even if you don’t like Wild Beasts you have to appreciate that they sound much different to a lot of stuff at the moment. For that I tip my hat off to them, it would be so easy for a band to be middle of the road much like the bands mentioned. Wild Beasts are certainly not middle of the road, I can’t quite believe that they are from Leeds. You would never know (this being a good thing) and at times you would mistake them for being from across the pond.

At times they sound like Editors circa the first album and at other times I can hear Arcade Fire but most of the time I just hear Wild Beasts. Newest single ‘The Devil’s Crayon’ was the song which made me listen to the album, after seeing it on MTV2 I decided it was definitely time for a listen to the album. However the newest single isn’t the only great song on ‘Limbo, Panto’ bizarrely named ‘Woeboegone Wanderers’ sounds like an obscure Sunday league football team, either way the song is pretty epic.

‘The Old Dog’ is yet another fine moment on the record and believe me there are many: ‘Vigil For A Fuddy Duddy’, ‘The Club of Fathomless Love’ and ‘Brave Bulging Buoyant Clairvoyants’ for example. What I will say about ‘Limbo, Panto’ is that I have to be in the right mood to listen to it but when I am in that mood ‘Limbo, Panto’ is a stunning album. When I’m not I have to turn it off and listen to something else.

7.5/10

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