Stealing Green Day riffs is a dangerous business. First the instant recognition that’s undoubtedly going to occur and thus the consequential remarks along the lines of “Green Day anyone?†or “Wait a minute, I’ve heard this beforeâ€; secondly, it’s really a rather dull pastime, there are so many things one can do with a guitar it would be nice to think bands could just leave Green Day‘s riffs alone, but thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, they really are pretty damn good riffs and if you’re going to rip someone off its nice to have a little class when doing it. Now there are ways you can get away with it. Number one, you could claim you wrote the song first, but Billie Joe and his army of lawyers might not look to kindly on that approach, alternatively you could play music like Instant Species‘.
Coming across like some horribly isfigured, bastard child of The Beach Boys and god knows who, “Huddersfield’s finest†(sheesh) are really rather pleasant. No, they’re really pretty good. Actually. I don’t care about the Green Day riffs. That’s right, I don’t. They’ve done the mpossible here and frankly more power to them. There are some terrible, terrible lyrics on offer: “she gives me nothing/ I’m insane/ she gets everywhere/ like the rainâ€, its so bad it has to work. The second song starts off with lovely little sample, “I won’t bite you unless you beg me to…†, and then slipping into Jam-esque guitars and machine gun drums. This is great.
Instant Species are like the band you can imagine your dad being in, playing songs about underage girls, porn and Van Halen, it’s entirely predictable, crude and comes replete with “woahs†and “woosâ€, handclaps and surf guitars. Its embarrassing . And I love it.
www.instantspecies.co.uk
Steve