The Coral

by

The Coral

Edit

I am a fan of new retro bands like The Walkmen, The Strokes, Frech Kicks, The Hives, etc, etc. But it gets old at times. When I saw this band, The Coral, on Conan O'Brien a week or so ago, I was immediately at attention. They played the song "Dreaming Of You". I just knew that I had to hear more. As soon as I did, I immediately began to wonder how I would possibly describe them to my friends. I can hear so many old Rock n'Roll influences in the music, that it's hard to pick one. The Beatles is the best way to describe it, in a different way than other bands. If you ask most rock bands nowadays the top five bands that influenced them the most, 9 out of 10 would say The Beatles, but, for The Coral, it is in a much more direct sense. I wouldn't be surprised if they started as a Beatles cover band by the way they sound, in the same way that is not surprising in the least bit that The Vines started as a Nirvana cover band. But don't think for a second that only Beatles fans will be interested. I am a mainly ska and punk (or ska-punk if you'd prefer to mix the two) guy myself. But this is still one of my favorite new bands, along with Authority Zero, Maroon 5 and Andrew W.K. See what I mean about varied musical tastes loving this band? This is the most original, incredible music I've heard in a LONG time.

The Coral's debut album sounds like it came through a musical time warp from the past, which, on some cosmic level probably makes them very similar to the Squirrel Nut Zippers. With reverb-y guitars and a vintage vibe on songs such as "Goodbye","Dreaming of You" or the opener, "Spanish Main," these guys could have played at the Cavern Club in the early 60s. But they are not just re-treads or throw-backs. Nearly every song is inhabited by a variety of stylistic influences, multiple tempo changes and theatrical three-part harmonies. "Simon Diamond" is one example, although it does contain the album's best turn of phrase: "now he's swapped his legs for roots, his arms and soil are in cahoots" Listen, if you can, to "Skeleton Key," and you'll hear a band unafraid to take chances, even if they sound like a klezmer band that got too deep into a bowl of rum punch. With multiple lyrical references to the sea (including their name), The Coral seem to fancy themselves as pirates, plundering various musical styles for their own salty songs. Well-versed musicians, they use any style and any instrument they can to get the job done, from accordions to banjos. The impressive part is that they do all this in less than four minutes per song. It's clever and heady stuff, though not always listenable.