Jamie Will Never Be President,
Switch NXThank fuck, not another band jumping aboard an already sold out bandwagon driven by the delusion that Morrissey is still cool. As soon as I heard the opening chords of this Leicestershire based skate-pop-punk band a smile lit up my bored face; something oh so familiar yet strangely missed, kind of like meeting up with an old friend. The band have only been around a couple of years but this E.P sounds fairly promising and the good production only bodes them well.
Right from the off on opening track, ‘Learning to Escape’ the NOFXy guitars and tempo change all give the indication this band are capable of writing a good song and that they are. However, I don’t think they are quite there yet. Whilst a glimpse of something special shines through in various places across the CD, for example the intro to ‘Hetrophony’, there’s just something missing overall and thus hindering this from being a stunning effort.
The blatant omission, to be blunt, is memorable hooks; you can throw in all the well executed jazz guitar interludes you like, in fact please do, (‘Calender Kid’) but if you haven’t got a memorable chorus or catchy riff to make you want to come back to it over and over again it’s a bit wasted, in my eyes anyway. Another general criticism is the NFG/American pop-punk sounding vocals, I hate them personally but that’s just one of my pet hates and it all comes down to personal taste, unless I read Leicestershire instead Santa Barbara of course.
As I said in the opening paragraph, this CD shows a lot of promise and indeed potential but I don’t think I’ll be seeing SWITCH NX on Scuzz in the immediate future. But give them time and allow them to mature and I think SWITCH NX will pack a hard punch as opposed to their current jab. Not a bad effort in the slightest, just not quite hitting the target.
Mike
www.switchnx.tk
