Out of bleak times comes excellent music though. The recession of the late 70s saw the disgruntled manifest their angst in the form of punk and other strange new forms - Coventry's The Specials put out the seminal ska classic 'Ghost Town' as their comment on the Brixton race riots and general shit-holing of the country's major cities.
One of 2002's answers to (admittedly slightly less) bleak times also hail from Coventry, but their job is not to comment about the state of affairs. Hell no, these boys come to rock, and you will know them by the name of Thoria.
'Love Sick' is the first full length album from the band, and it's a belter. In its ten catchy as shit tracks it manages to reference Nirvana (traces of Bleach stain 'What a Day'), The Wildhearts (particularly on the rousing, anthemic 'People Like You') and even, fuck, Wilco (listen to 'Navigator' back to back with Wilco's 'Sunken Treasure'). Throw on top frontman Mart's hugely versatile lullabye-to-a-growl-in-0.6-seconds voice and you're onto a winner.
While plenty of influences have gone into the hot pot, the flavour is all their own. Singles 'I Got Satan' and 'Keep 'Em In the Attic' give it large with the quiet / loud / quiet / loud rock dynamics, whereas closer 'This Reception' revisits old track 'Say These Words' with plenty more oomph - check out the gnarling bassline if you don't believe me.
Elsewhere, 'Misery' affirms what many of us have always believed with lines like "I need misery in my life cause misery helps me to write." All the while avoiding the crass angst-to-measure sentiments of today's miserablist metallers. And 'Hula' has to be the best song named after a Hawaiian dance ritual ever, with the refrain "There goes one more summer that I'll always hate!" It's safe to love rock again!
'Love Sick' is a sign - all of our futures are going to be a lot rosier with Thoria around. A very healthy debut for a band without the financial backing of an established label, any flaws are rendered obsolete by the abundance of both excellent tunes and promise.
Thoria - Love Sick
hasn't left my stereo for ages
truly refreshing in a hearditbefore way
Re: Thoria - Love Sick
Re: Thoria - Love Sick
Re: Thoria - Love Sick
thinking for a while - there's loads of shitty stuff going down in politics
at the moment, what with that texan toerag Dubya trying to run round bombing civilians ( wish I could find the right words to
write a piece about the sick amount of anti-muslim racism that we're almost ENCOURAGED to practise...
anyway.... whay the fuck don't bands write ( as the Specials/Clash/Pistols/Dead Kennedys etc...) about any of it...
I've got to say I'm getting SO bored with the Nirvana legacy of every little spotty c**t thinking I WANT to know about
how sad he was when he split up from his girlfriend and his dad used to stop him watching telly on Saturdays and wasn't it unfair, and feel his screaming rage...
yet simultaneously there are poor fucks getting bombed to fragments, and kids having their whole familes wiped out...
...and this is stuff that people really DO have strong views and passion about.
Why are modern bands so politically castrated?
Shit... Eminem is so SAFE... he's never had a go at Uncle Sam ONCE... 'that' video was a drop of limpid piss compared to Frankie Goes To Hollywood 'Two Tribes'
bah humbug!
Re: Thoria - Love Sick
On the other hand though, there are bands who -- while shirking their responsibility to open a few eyes to some of the real tragedies of the world -- aren't spending their time turning their molehills into mountains by whining at kids about their issues. I think there's space for them, even right now.