Chapel Club - O Maybe I

There are certain kinds of bands and singers who turn self-reflection and introspection into a bit of an art form, and judging by their new single ‘O Maybe I’, London five-piece Chapel Club are about to join just that club. Think Morrissey pouring his heart out, bleeding for us so we don’t have to, or the soaring, epic melodrama of Keane. And there’s even a smattering of perhaps that most inward looking of all bands, The Cure, in the gigantic lolloping bass and hefty drums underpinning the melody at all times.

On paper, the idea for the song seems pretty hackneyed, possibly verging on dull – drums, bass, guitar, vocals and a bloke going on about lost love, but there’s something indefinable and intriguing going on just below the surface that makes you keep hitting the repeat button. Perhaps it’s because ultimately ‘O Maybe I’ is somehow greater than the sum of its parts, raised a notch or two above the standard indie fare, lifting you up in its arms and whispering a warped lullaby to failed love into your eager ears.

Singer Lewis is adept at Mr Morrissey’s style of bitter, catty ripostes (“What do you mean I sound cynical?/Can’t you see this is more than a grudge?”) and it’s obvious his sideways look at love will ring true with the acres of lovelorn folk out there. Of course the huge danger with this kind of laying-your-heart-on-your-sleeve approach is that we all go ‘Oh for goodness sake! Go and have a beer and shut up!’ but in the right hands such as Chapel Club, reflective rock can be a thing of delicate, subtle, swoonsome beauty, making even the most cynical, dispassionate listener care just a tiny bit.