Schmuck -
Messy Memories
What a bloody weird
band. Sadly, for the most part, not the good kind of weird. Messy
Memories begins reasonably enough, with circling arpeggios
strangely reminiscent of Fightstar. Then, in it glides, with the
stealth of a ninja and uncompromising aural violence of cutlery on
old plates (forget your nails on chalkboards, that’s the one that
always gets me) – a vocal suggesting a heavily tonsilitic James
Hetfield and Michael Stipe attempting a senile nursing home duet.
With lots of ridiculously, Dr-Cox-from-Scrubs-style over-laboured
syllables (opener Error Count allows “vision” and “describe”
four each, with the latter pronounced “dee-scry-eeb”). It’s almost
laughably irritating.
Musically the first
song unintentionally plots the downfall of REM, with subtle, ebbing
post-punk Murmur guitars replaced by brash Monster-style
fuzziness. To give The Schmucks their due, none of these songs are
short of hooks, but neither are McFly’s. They’re also clearly very
competent musicians – but so are Spinal Tap. Actually, that’s an
interesting reference, because it is possible that this record is a
joke, in which case this reviewer has been quite expertly fooled.
Sadly that seems unlikely.
It doesn’t get any
better. Quo Vadis’ intro again recalls REM, and the dreamy
bass-led Belong, from 1991’s Out Of Time. The Error
Count formula is repeated, with largely palatable verses (if you
ignore the vocals) shattered by an uninspiring chorus. This,
however, is nothing short of a joy when compared with what comes
next. The More That Things Change is the token ballad, and
features pronunciation of quite epic awfulness – “fing” (thing),
“duh” (the), and “feenk” (think) providing the worst examples. The
line “I don’t think it’s funny how you take the p*ss right out of my
dreams” just about sums up the clumsy wording and half-arsed
sentiments.
Stripped-back closer Step Out
is comfortably the most bearable thing here, with louder background
harmonies slightly cancelling out the grating lead. The clean
acoustic tones and simple chord progressions are similarly
listenable, if unexciting. Unfortunately, however, throughout "Messy Memories",
Schmuck more than live up to their name.
Rich Partington
www.myspace.com/richthejournalist
