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Yeah So is the first album from Slow Club, a cute boy-girl duo (Charles and
Rebecca) from Sheffield, whose fun live performances have been known to
feature the use of a range of unconventional "instruments" for percussive
purposes (bottle tops, the backs of chairs). Despite all these entertaining antics being invisible when listening to their album,
they have nonetheless managed to infuse this recording with a comparable
endearingly off-the-wall feel.
Both band members are gifted and agreeable vocalists, and lead vocal
duties are shared around throughout the album. Sometimes they harmonise with
each other within one song (Giving Up On Love), and at others they alternate within
a track (It Doesn't Have To Be Beautiful). Then again there's just the
one or other on 'lead' vocal.
This latter set-up is most notably put to use on Sorry About The Doom: a
revelatory track towards the end of the album, where the listener is able to
fully appreciate just what a glorious singing voice Rebecca possesses.
Bags of charm is in evidence, both in the singing voices and also in the
kind of youthful insouciance which the music somehow conveys, particularly
on the perkier, more upbeat tracks which constitute about half of the
album.
It is quite surprising, then, when listening to the
lyrics, to realise that a great many of the featured songs are based around
romantic failures and break-ups, from I Was Unconscious, It Was A Dream's
"I let you say 'I love you' / When I know I'll never say it back" to Sorry
About The Doom's "I agree, you were right to say we're doomed" to songs
simply called There's No Good Way To Say I'm Leaving You or Giving Up On
Love.
There's a lot of heartbreak here, lying
half-hidden by all the quirk and musical cheer. In other places, the
lyrical content is a little more oblique and impressionistic (standout track
and former single Because We're Dead), or skirting dangerously close to
"novelty track" (opener When I Go).
The programming is interesting, in that the order of tracks
seems to have been deliberately chosen so that upbeat, quicker songs and
slower more downbeat ones alternate nearly the entire way through. On the
whole this works well and avoids the common sag often found in an album's
middle. Conversely, the largely unnecessary and irritating device of
putting a "hidden" track at the end is less welcome and, indeed, the said
track itself - as so often is the way - is not really worth the dead air
time that precedes it.
The often-acoustic, slightly folk- or country-tinged arrangements,
coupled with the aforementioned engaging vocals (each offsetting the other
most pleasingly) also work well, and enhance the collection of songs. While
Giving Up On Love (with its Swinging Sixties pop feel), Because We're Dead
and Sorry About The Doom are unquestionable highlights, there is scarcely a
track here that is anything less than likeable, charming and pleasingly,
authentically redolent of the loves, joys and losses of The Dating
Years.
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