Coming from the same thoroughbred as northern tykes Dartz!, the posituvely puppy-like Alsatian have sent us two Cds to review in the last few months, so I thought I'd bark my way through one review encompassing both records. Probably chucking in the odd canine pun along the way...
Neither EP is named, so we shall go off on the colour of the album sleeve. 'Grey' is the older record and one that wears its indie rock heart firmly on its sleeve. Not too dissimilar from Dartz! the band have a chugging guitar sound and a canny knack for writing a gritty pop song without losing any of that northern bite. 'Television's On' and 'Working Saturday Night' are actually good little tracks; roughly recorded but diamonds in the rough nevertheless. There's a northern charm with Alsatian and there are far worse records around than this one. (6)
The 'Yellow' record seems to have added a rather kookier feel, as 'You Only Say I Love You When You're Drunk' adds keys and some kind of annoying percussion. The production is extremely rough - the guitars seem to suffer most because you can almost feel when the distortion pedal is pressed - but the band manage to detract from the quality of the recording by writing a couple of decent tunes. There's very little difference between the two records, the keys aside, although on 'Yellow' the band have certainly taken up the catchy choruses a notch. 'Alsatian Comeback Special' sounds pretty neat - and I guess that's good enough for me to give the dog a bone. (7)
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