The Dirty Dozen: Frightened Rabbit Takeover - March, 2010

Reviewing Personnel:
Scott Hutchison (guitar/vocals)
Grant Hutchison (drums)

Dan Le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip – Get Better (Sunday Best, 1 Mar)
Scott: It sounds like a kind of educational Streets.
Grant: It’s not as clever as the Streets. It sounds like a DJ has found an old recording of elocution lessons and put it against a dance track.
Scott: I’m going to give it a six [out of ten].
Grant: Yeah, it’s a strong pass.

Fanfarlo – Harold T. Wilkins , or How to Wait for a Very Long Time (Atlantic, 8 Mar)
Grant: [immediately] Bit Smashing Pumpkins, there.
Scott: [later] It seems to be going on. I think I’m going to turn it off.
Grant: No, I’m enjoying it. Something’s going to happen soon.
Scott: Is it really!? Bet you a pound it doesn’t.
[The track shifts up an octave to a pleasing result]
Scott: Maybe I’ll give you 50p then. It’s come good.
Grant: That’s an eight.

North Atlantic Oscillation – Drawing Maps Form Memory (Kscope, 8 Mar)
Scott: It’s like Mew.
Grant: I really like the backing but the vocals are a bit watery.
Scott: I think it works.
[There’s a crunchy guitar bridge breaking the ethereal vibe]
Scott: [scrunching up face] That bit I like less. I like my songs to be a bit more consistent. But I like it overall. That’s a seven.

She and Him – In The Sun (Domino, 15 Mar)
Scott: Could be Wilco at this point. The drum sound is classic.
Grant: You can imagine girls like Zooey Deschanel dancing along to this and loving it in their floral pattern dresses.
Scott: She has a very distinctive voice as well.
Grant: I like it. A seven?
Scott: Yeah, OK.

Arctic Monkeys – My Propeller (Domino, 22 Mar)
Scott: They’re not appealing to the kids and they’re not even trying to. It’s pretty grown up.
Grant: If you heard this as a track by any other band it would be the single of the month.
Scott: Although if you sped it up it would probably just sound like a riff from the first album.
Grant: Yeah.
Scott: But on its own as a single it’s good. I can’t find it in me to give it a drubbing, so it’s a six from me.

Expatriate – Blackbird (La Digit, 1 Mar)
Scott: Death Cab on a bad day, so far.
[A kick drum comes in]
Grant: There you go!
Scott: Ha ha. I was just gonna say...
Grant: Yeah, there was either going to be a ‘tss tss’ propulsive cymbal there...
Scott: ...or a kick drum. I bet they’re all really good looking. I’m sure they’ll be supporting loads of bands for years and years to come.
Grant: It’s a four and that’s being kind.

First Aid Kit – I Met Up With The King (Wichita, 1 Mar)
Grant: Nothing wrong with it. It’s nice.
Scott: There’s a lot of this female duo thing going on. It seems too content with itself.
Grant: There’s not much of a melodic hook is there?
Scott: [turning it off] I’m going to call that a five. Weird that that should be a single.

The Hidden Cameras – Underage (Arts and Crafts, 29 Mar)
Scott: I’m going to give this a ten before I’ve even heard it!
[He hears it]
Scott: Man, it’s quite cheesy. There’s no ‘diamonds on the soles of their shoes’ production going on here.
Grant: Sounds like a kids TV theme tune.
Scott: Yeah, it’s weird. If it wasn’t them I might give this hell. I want to give it an eight though.
Grant: What!? I’ll have to give it a one then to even it out. So that’s, what, a five?

Peggy Sue – Watchman (Wichita, 22 Mar)
[There is a long silence. We point this out to the boys]
Scott: It makes you want to listen I suppose. That’s why we’re so silent.
Grant: It’s going well.
Scott: It keeps changing. That’s good. It’s like a campfire at Glastonbury.
Grant: That’s it done. We listened to it all the way through.
Scott: That’s a seven I think.

Eugene and The Lizards – Bug Juice (Domino, 1 Mar)
Scott: In my head this guy’s got a quiff. It’s not something I would put on willingly.
Grant: Yeah, I’m finding it a bit irritating.
Scott: I can see some people would enjoy that but they’re the sort of people who have been listening to the same music since 1979.
Grant: What are we giving it?
Scott: Does it matter? Four?

Broken Bells – The High Road (Columbia, 8 Mar)
Scott: I’m definitely a fan of Danger Mouse’s production in general. When I heard he was doing something with James Mercer [of The Shins] it just seemed right. This sounds like the Shins with a bit of swagger about them.
Grant: This bit here, I can just hear the Shins.
Scott: At face value it’s fine but there’s something more interesting about it because of the history of the two people involved. That’s an unavoidable way of listening to it really.
Grant: Let’s give it a seven then.

Woodenbox with a Fistful of Fivers – Besides The Point (Electric Honey Records, 29 Mar)
Scott: Very cool. The brass is awesome.
Grant: It sounds like it’s just a bunch of people in a room playing and someone has just hit ‘record’. There’s that kind of ramshackle element to it. It really suits the song. You wouldn’t not dance to that.
Scott: [mocking] You “wouldn’t not?” Therefore you would?
Grant: Yeah. I’m muddling things with my double negatives.
[The song ends]
Scott: Fuck yeah. Single o’ the month. Stick a nine on that.