Excuse me\u2026are you one of us?<\/p>\n
Who Bid is talking to remains unclear in the opening track \u201cIceman,\u201d which is perhaps the point. With a fair amount of snark and a blend of various rock movements of the last 40 years, Spaces Everywhere <\/i>dares you to dislike its cheeky charms. Of course, sarcasm and cheerfulness have been this band\u2019s stock in trade since their 1980 debut, but the band continues to push forward with its sound and approach.<\/p>\n
Yet while many of the songs lack gravity and staying power, they are quite fun, especially the two-step country flavor of \u201cThe Z Train\u201d (which recalls Prefab Sprout\u2019s \u201cFaron Young,\u201d and both that band and this band have much in common). This band was an influence on the Smiths, so one might be tempted to think a song like \u201cAvenue\u201d was derived from Morrisey\u2019s band, when in fact it is the other way around (plus, Morrisey would never have allowed the cheesy prog-rock keyboards straight out of a Kansas song).<\/p>\n
The Britpop, American country, postpunk, Velvet Underground and pop grab bag that comprises this disc is appealing, though, even if the songwriting doesn\u2019t measure up. Bid\u2019s vocals are unsurprisingly similar to Morrisey\u2019s, with hints of Iggy Pop and lower-register David Bowie, with a slight sense of being above it all but not ironically so. It\u2019s a perfect voice and approach for today\u2019s indie rock scene; perhaps Monochrome Set was ahead of their time and now the world will catch up.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn A Little Village\u201d is a slightly dark and quite nice acoustic tune, while the closing title song is flat-out hippie prog-pop that may or may not be a joke. The lyrics are goofy, but the clarion acoustic strums, flute breaks and general earnestness makes it seem real. It\u2019s a fascinating little tune, to be sure, not quite in step with the rest of the record, which makes it even better. However, \u201cIceman\u201d remains the highlight, an odd, energetic song that would be a fine single, although I have no idea in what format or station. More likely, \u201cFantasy Creatures\u201d will be picked up by today\u2019s skinny-jean hipsters, and that\u2019s not a bad choice either.<\/p>\n
Spaces Everywhere <\/i>won\u2019t change your life by any means, but it\u2019s something a little different, a little more energetic and a little less serious than your average indie-pop-rock disc, from a band that has been doing their own thing for over three decades now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":45,"featured_media":32329,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[9609],"rating":[5614],"class_list":["post-44081","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-the-monochrome-set","rating-rating-c-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/45"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44081"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44081\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=44081"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=44081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}