Dance To The Radio - 4 x 12” Vol. 3

Onto Volume Three in the brilliant Dance To The Radio EP series, and the objective is clear. Rather than providing a cohesive collection, DTTR are bringing you samples of the underground from all over the place. Yes, you could just download these tracks from blogs, but it’s not quite the same as having them on a nice 12’ record is it?

Side one here is cracking, featuring Dance To The Radio hallmarks of REALLY loud rock music and something completely from the left-field. The former slot is filled by Chickenhawk’s hardcore thrash track ‘Scorpieau’. With excellent drum fills and some double kick action underpinning a frighteningly lively song it’s exactly what you’d not expect from the label that bought you The Pigeon Detectives. Neither is ‘Skeleton Swoon’, by Ebsen and the Witch. Samples of dialogue, discussing the advent of X-Ray scans, opens the track before giving way to Florence (and the Machine) style vocals and a twinkling xylophone backing. Interspersed with more vocal samples it manages to be both prettily epic and oddly minimal.

Side two falls down slightly, however, meaning that thus far this is the weakest EP in the series. That’s not to say that the music’s terrible, you understand, just that it’s entirely expected. Both Olfar’s ‘Husk’ (Demo) and Airship’s ‘Spirit Party’ are jangly, pleasant indie-pop songs that are neither here nor there, unless of course ‘there’ is your standard hipster blog – in which case they certainly are ‘there’. The former of the two sounds as though it has its roots in British Sea Power’s second album whilst the latter opens sounding like Pixies. Not just a little bit like Pixies but EXACTLY like Pixies. The bassline is to thank for this, having the same steady harshness that Kim Deal is famous for. Sadly, instead of exploding in a completely copycat fashion ‘Spirit Party’ sort of plods along like Voxtrot without the heartache or Good Shoes on a slow day.

A slight dip maybe, but still worthwhile for Side A. Hopefully the conclusion to the series will bring it back up to the usual DTTR standards.