‘Today We’re Believers‘, the debut album from Winnipeg’s Royal Canoe ticks all the modern indie boxes. Quirky, deceptively minimalist, summery dream pop indie with anthemic vocal melodies that despite their infectious nature, don’t lyrically seem to mean a god damn thing. Songs such as previous single, ‘Hold on to the Metal‘, as well as upcoming single ‘Bathtubs‘ show why the band might be such a success in the UK as we move ever further away from summer. With tight sunny guitar licks and well thought out repeated choruses, you can see why the band have already been tagged as Temper Trap-like, and despite an often experimental and complex approach to song composition along with an almost hip-hop approach to percussion, Royal Canoe like Temper Trap have that knack of being deliciously pop.
It’s on songs like ‘Exodus of the Year‘ and ‘Show Me Your Eyes‘ where the band show their strengths though. ‘Exodus of the Year‘ is a no showboating beauty of a song that doesn’t need to rely on being quirky to be brilliant, and for the first time shows a sensitive contemplative side which is inclusive of brass and string sections. If Sigur Ros were to write a mainstream song, ‘Exodus of the Year‘ would be it, which as a massive Sigur Ros fan, is huge praise indeed. On the other hand, ‘Show Me Your Eyes‘ is a fun, uptempo dance floor filler of a track that with its various entwining rhythms almost begs you to jig along to it. If this track doesn’t get remixed and put in clubs I will be very surprised.
It isn’t all good news for Royal Canoe though, and five or six fantastic songs aside, there are at least three tracks on the album that are quite simply put, very average. I often wonder why bands feel they have to have albums with thirteen plus songs when they only have ten good tracks. It is to the detriment of ‘Today We’re Believers‘ that the average songs seem to be wedged in between the great ones, but on the strength of seventy percent of the album I think this should be forgiven. After all, ‘Today We’re Believers‘ is a debut album, and it is a fantastic stab at a tired NME styled fanfare that already seems to be slowing down with bands like Temper Trap and Yeasayer releasing poor follow ups to fantastic albums (with Alt-J sure to be next on that list).
So if you want your summer continue despite rain pummeling your windows, or you want something that is easy on the ear but still challenging in its own right, then ‘Today We’re Believers‘ is definitely for you.
[Rating: 3.5]
