Fire in the disco? Not a chance.
Sunny Day Sets Fire - what a wonderful name. I have no idea what it’s meant to mean, but it certainly catches your attention. And the fact that individuals in this band hail from as far apart as Hong Kong, Italy, Canada, and the UK adds a mysterious multi-national twist in the run-up to actually listening to the single.
Unfortunately, that’s as interesting as it gets. There’s nothing that ‘sets fire’ to anything with the bland, one-tone indie pop offering that is ‘Stranger’. The (very flash) band website describes them as “epic psychedelic pop”, and you can hear what they’re trying to get at, but they don’t quite reach it. And it’s hard to define quite why. It’s not that there’s anything technically wrong with the vocals, but they’re fairly quiet, and well, flat. The beat is repetitive ad nauseum, without any particularly outstanding musical moments to speak of.
And then the ultimate irritation. I’m not a fan of remixes at the best of times, but to remix something this dire is like repainting a beige wall in a slightly different shade of beige. The Slips remix repeats the band’s name over and over until the novelty wears off, and then covers the low-key song with overpowering scratchy-sounding synths. By this time I’m considering switching the CD off.
The CSS remix of ‘Wilderness’ is slightly more interesting, turning slightly disco and stripping back the ‘all or nothing’ instruments found on ‘Stranger’ to a few beeps, synths, and shouts of ‘hey!’. ‘Adrenaline’ is another disappointment. While it’s not bland per se, it certainly lacks anything that actually keeps my attention. The stuttered, synthed-up vocals make it a pretty good dance tune. But then again, who actually listens to club music? There’s a reason you go to clubs to get hammered, and I deeply suspect it’s the music. Except this is club music without the mass appeal.
This is where the EP loses the plot completely. It becomes impossible to tell whether you’re listening to different songs, or just remixes of what you’ve heard before, it’s that unoriginal after the first few tracks. And someone decided it needed eight remixes! Just one word… help!