The Scaramanga Six - Songs Of Prey

are the outsiders outsiders. An ‘evil pop’ group based in Huddersfield that sound part Queen part Queens of the Stone Age and lots of parts something else. ‘Songs of Prey’ may not be their best album (that award surely goes to ‘The Dance of Death’) but should please anyone who wants a dose of music that’s quiet simply fucking weird. This is cinematic art-rock that combines thrashing guitars with orchestral and distinctly non-rock instruments to create something individual and that has instant replay value.

It’s possible to criticise the Six (currently consisting of five members) for creating music that’s at times a bit too much to take in, but this isn’t a band who are creating music for Radio One. This is rather a band who’s efforts have been to eschew any music scene and remain as apart from the music industry as feasibly possible. It’s worked wonders for them as their formula is one that no band in the public eye could make work and it’s one that no big record label would even try and sell.

There’s so many good tracks on this record that we can’t mention them all, but amongst the highlights are: ‘I Didn’t Get Where I Am Today’ which feels like a Victorian Maxïmo Park, interlocking piano lines with fuzzy-yet-sharp guitar riffs; the furious mini-anthem that is ‘Back To School’; the string accompanied ‘By-Product’; and ‘You Should Have Killed Me When You Had The Chance’ which sees frontman Steven Morricone at his most Freddie Mercury juxtaposing with a relentless guitar assault. Only the Tenacious D like ‘Misadventure’ is what we’d call a misstep.

This is pop music that’s not only absurd but pop music that’s aware of the inherent absurdities of creating pop music. Yes, there’s moments where you feel that the most appropriate action to take whilst listening to the record is to thrust your fist in the air in a stadium rock fashion, but somehow this bombast is endearing, where we would expect it to be off-putting.