Landon Pigg – LP

He’s attractive, American, plays guitar and likes to get emotive. But he’s calledPigg, so stick a flower in his hand and we’ll call it fresh. Without doubt there is adecent voice shining through this LP called LP, but primarily the album is indicative of a guy who”likes it when life happens naturally”. Very, very normal.

A significant downside of this laborious 12-track affair is that every track soundsalmost identical. Think of a backing soundtrack for an episode of your favourite teendrama, and you will have LP down to a tee. Opening track Can’t Let Go sets theprecedent; Pigg’s vocals arrive almost instantly, and the tidy instrumental section isnever given room to breathe. As a result, all attention is drawn to the singer’s over-keen vocal experimentation, which at times is just unnecessary. The chorus which,funnily enough, goes “I can’t let go” has enough of a melody to sustain attention, butit is nothing that Dashboard Confessional have not already covered.

Last Stop follows the same path (“when it comes to us, I was getting tired ofpretending it was love”) and never once succeeds in breaking from the mundane. JustLike I Am took four years to write, and one wonders why such an effort was gone to.It is perfectly possible to predict what is about to happen in each of these songs, andregardless of how agreeable the sound is, that is a disaster.

Fans of Puddle of Mudd may hear the ghost of She Fuckin’ Hates Mein the track Trickery, a track in which Pigg’s poetic influence comes to the forewith the line “I’m like a homeless man caught in a storm, with no point to run forcover”. So brilliant that I have no idea what it means. Thankfully this is followed byone of LP’s better moments, Magnetism. With a good deal more aggression in thevocals and a decent guitar hook, there is something here to get immersed in. Onebright point is followed by another, the quiet ballad Sailed On. A slow piano-ledbuild up breaks into a tender lament of lost love, which is by no means in the realmsof Jeff Buckley, but at least shows some progress.

Unfortunately moments of promise such as this do no more than briefly raiseexpectancies. Overall LP seems a very calculated, simple affair, and this is summed upby its closing track On The Other Side. With one of the main lines being “Don’t letlife pass you by”, it is clear that Pigg is not dealing with particularly meaty subjectmatter, and the rest of the song similarly fails to challenge. This is a typically bouncyconcert closer about living life to its fullest and looking forwards instead of back, butthen you knew it would be.

Despite a very good vocal performance and an album rife with decent melodichooks, this is an album that you are more than likely to forget. A very flat anduninspiring piece of nicely-packaged fluff. And fluff easily dissipates.