The Drums

With all the hype these guys have had I'm amazed to find barely a mention of them here. Now's your chance to talk about the fresh, happening indie surf pop sound of The Drums.

fresh, happening indie surf pop sound

Stopped reading here.

so you read everything but the last three words

I forgot to mention the whistling. Not to eveyone's taste admittedly.

so you read everything but the last three words

Precisely.

:-)

songs are pretty good. level of attention is ridiculous though. they're selling out 1500-2000 capacity venues in london off the back of nme hype.

the kids are really into these guys, yes. apparently when the girls from camera obscura sang with them in glasgow a few months back it was really great.

They seem likeable enough. There aren't many better things to revive than surf guitar pop.

shit, i'm in a surf guitar pop band!

*gets rich*

Their songwriting abilities (specifically "Let's Go Surfing") suggest that they could be great someday, but they aren't close yet

so how's the album then?

these guys are suprisingly good! kind of on a more mersh tough alliance/air france tip. "i felt stupid" is one of my jams of the year, great harmonies and arrangements. like their image too, knowing in a good way. will deffo check out the album.

good to see ilx not getting sucked into the hype. no vampire weekend thread style clusterfuck for these guys!

no angle

this album isn't coming out in America until September, which will have additional songs. haven't heard it yet but interested.

Vampire weekend where deserving of the clusterfuck hype because they were/are doing something few had tried until that point. The Drums, on the other hand, pay hommage the surf/garage/rockabilly scene which has been already thoroughly explored by the indie scene in the past decade.

It's more like Surf meets Factory. A lot like the first Wake 7", though with more cheery FL whistling and hand clapping, and less dour Glaswegian brooding.

I think this is easily my most played album of the last year and certainly my 1 year old daughter's favourite. Not sure I can justify my love for it - it's just incredibly moreish, in pretty much exactly the same way as the first Strokes album. In addition to Surf/Factory, bits of it remind of the Lotus Easters - "First Picture of You"-style spring rapture - and the kind of new wavy PsychFurs type thing you'd find on a John Hughes soundtrack. Some Jonathan Richman idiot glee also.

I checked out a few songs on-line and didn't really hear the surf angle as much as 80s style jangle pop with really tinny guitar tones. I guess I was expecting to hear some double picked guitar and it being really driving, which wasn't there.

earlnash otm. The frontman's Morrissey-esque posings complete the turn-off for me.

i'm really liking this album. i was put off by the single but it has some bite despite it being twee. i thought it was just surf pop but realize that was only really one or two songs.

this gives you a taste of their more 80's sound:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUubQj7g56E

Their songwriting abilities (specifically "Let's Go Surfing") suggest that they could be great someday, but they aren't close yet

see if i try really hard i can see that maybe this is objectively true, though i wouldn't go so far as to say great, but the problem is that (as with basically every contemporary band i listen to) i fucking HATE them. i watched that video, now i'm listening to the video bee ok posted (without watching, i'm writing this), and all i want to do is get into a fight with the people who made this music.

lol

not digging 'best friend.' seems like 'what if the smiths gave less of a shit?' in song form

The Drums' previous incarnation…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U251tbM3gYk

Oh shit, The Drums are/were really Elkland? GROSS.

just the singer dude

Wikipedia says they also share a guitarist.

Nevertheless, there is a similarity of bandwagon hopping.

good to see ilx not getting sucked into the hype. no vampire weekend thread style clusterfuck for these guys!

― max arrrrrgh

See, thing is, vampire weekend sort of deserves the hype for pushing a style few people have dared, let alone pull off whereas the drums are jumping on the garage/surf/lo-fi bandwagon that has been rolling around the indie scene for years now.

Only similar artist to vampire weekend I can think of right now: Paul Simon.
Similar artists to the drums I can think of right now: Real Estate, Girls, Harlem, The Pains of being pure at heart, Beach Fosssils, Best Coast, Christmas Island....

this has come out in America today, i think it has extra songs and is only $7.50 at Amazon.

i think the only record i went from loving to hating more quickly than this one is that last jarvis cocker thing

Let's Go Surfing - I normally have a natural aversion to this kind of thing but it's grown on me a lot and so catchy. I really like it. Not fussed about their other stuff at this stage.

The Future is just too damn good.

The French films ep sounds like a carbon copy of the drums

Enjoying The Drums. Hadn't bothered before watching the Nardwuar interview.

so Portamento out soon.
http://cdn.pitchfork.com/media/thedrums.jpg
01 Book of Revelation
02 Days
03 What You Were
04 Money
05 Hard to Love
06 I Don't Know How to Love
07 Searching for Heaven
08 Please Don't Leave
09 If He Likes It Let Him Do It
10 I Need a Doctor
11 In the Cold
12 How It Ended

Anxious to hear this, really liked the debut.

me too, new single "money" is sort of meh.

I was all "whatever" about this band until 'Let's Go Surfin' became my jam of the summer last year.

This new album is truly dire. And I probably played the last one more than any other lp in 2010.

Really? That's disappointing, to say the least. What makes it such a step down from the last one?

It's just a pretty half-assed effort - no songs, no hooks, no energy. Feels like a bunch of demos they couldn't be bothered to finish :(

Yeah, that sounds awful. The big hooks and big energy were what made the last one so endearing.

ugh

man, there has to be one song as good as "the future"

I sorta think "Money" is the best thing I've ever heard from them, so here's hoping I'll disagree just as much about the album being dire

ok so DAYS is good.

i will join the chorus, i really liked the first album, but this is dull and uninspired.

Feel a need to note that yes, I like this album as a whole, better than anything they've done before. It gets away from just sounding charming and scores more songs with some actual ... ache to them. Slightly baffled by the hate!

took me a bit, but i agree now. Loving it.

Never heard these guys before and usually find this kind of thing a bit 'meh' but 'Money' is in my head like ALL THE TIME and I kind of love it.

huh, so 'let's go surfing' popped into my head. signs of a catchy song if it comes back as an ear-worm five years after the fact.