Lecuce - 'From Here to Now'
A quick guide to press releases:
“Hint of the White Stripes”= terrible drummer, megalomaniac lead singer.
“Soon to be filling stadiums”: arrogant twats, incredibly bland rock music.
“The Clash of 2009”: Flimsy political opinions, flits from musical style to style...unconvincingly.
Get the jist? So when French singer/songwriter Lecube’s (real name Julien Barbagallo) press release for new album ‘From Here to Now’ drops through my door with the boast of being compared to “Syd Barrett, Bob Dylan and Stephen Malkmus”, I quickly realise that this has to be taken with a pinch of salt.
It’s high praise indeed, but what all these artists do have in common is simple fact that none of them can hold a tune. That is where the comparisons end. But fortunately for Lecube, just like his press release contemporaries, this is not reason enough to write him off.
Just to clear things up in advance, he is nowhere near the standard of Barret, Dylan or even Malkmus, but Lecube does seem to have a knack for writing sweet and catchy, melodious pop music. Often just supported by a acoustic guitar, his shaky vocals can come across as endearingly open and honest.
The best example of this can be found on the first single from the album, ‘Shoot the Nanny’, which is bare bones simple, but still delights with its delicately picked melody, and steady build to a sing a long ending.
The songs can occasionally lapse into the sort of fragility that Belle & Sebastian captured so frequently, particularly on ‘Lady Pornograph’, which shakes like buckling knees under a mighty pile of books.
Unfortunately though, this level of nakedness doesn’t always work and listening to the album as a whole can become tiresome. If Lecube was playing live in front of you , only the strongest minds wouldn’t feel an urge to shake the man into growing a backbone.
There is some light relief in the shape of ‘I’ve Just Seen a Face’ and the opening minute and a half ‘Creatures’ which shift the tempo a step or two and whiffs of a playful Simon & Garfunkel and Rolling Stones respectively.
Still, Bob Dylan? Not at all!