Islands - Return To The Sea

The Unicorns splitting up meant very little to me. My perception of them was that of a half decent pop band with an over powering undeserved sense of their own importance. That sense causing the music to seem like an empty, dull experience when if the pomposity had been played down, "Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone?" could have been a fantastic little slice of happy-go-lucky indy-pop. But when such sweet and well intentioned lyrics (drove myself in to emergency/urgently) were sung with all the self importance of a man who's just found a cure for cancer, I no longer wanted anything to do with it. Upon listening to this Islands debut I felt vaguely inclined to give The Unicorns' cult success in disc form another go. Perhaps thinking there was something I'd missed before. I was wrong, it was still the over glorified piece of ego frenzied pop that it ever was. A fucking headache that I turned off after a few tracks.

I'm sure those of you that have already heard this album are now completely at a loss as to why I'm posting this and thus in my own very little way, helping to promote it. Islands still has that hugely pretentious edge that it's farther band shared and this time they've been given the opportunity to experiment with anything and everything that pops in to their little minds. An immediate fan base will do that for you. Why they actually thought a section of rapping was a good idea and would aid people's enjoyment of their music is beyond me. But if truth be told, Islands have actually managed to create a record with a far less disposable base than their members previous efforts and thus over shadowed the awkward posturing with some dreamy and interesting progression. The post-rock flirting, build up of an album opener "Swans (Life After Death)" is in every way more enjoyable than anything The Unicorns ever spit out and when the song writing loses it's desire to gratify itself, what's produced is thoroughly enjoyable.

Islands - Swans (Life After Death)
Islands - Humans

Buy Return To The Sea from Amazon