A Brief History of Love

The music press have been quick list Big Pink's influences, and it's not difficult to see why. An amalgam of My Bloody Valentine, The Stone Roses (a Second Coming sensibility) and Richard Ashcroft produces an eclectic blend of rousing guitar, acoustic strumming and heartfelt vocals. Then consider Shed Seven but with melody and Doves with tempo and you are somewhere close to what Big Pink are about.

The opening track, 'Crystal Vision', sets the mood with big feedbacking guitar sounds and angelic backing vocals. The pace is not slackened with 'Too Young to Love' with its heaving power chords and rhythmic and doleful chanting. A switch to pop/rock territory with the anthemic 'Dominoes' and at this point this album has the potential to be one of the year's best releases. The fourth track, 'A Love in Vain' is a direct lift of Richard Ashcroft's 'The Drugs Don't Work' and the first disappointment. Back to form with the hippy, trippy, folksy 'At War with the Sun' and the Stones Roses-esque 'Velvet'.

The portentous Gothic 'A Brief History of Love' has stand-out backing vocals from Blackpudlian soloist Joanne Robertson. Her little-girl-lost soprano complementing front-man Milo Cordell to perfection. The electro-rock 'Tonight', with its fizzing guitar rifts and plonky keyboards is veering towards sing-along and foot-tapping territory. The closing track, the slow-tempo and solemn 'Count Backwards From Ten' with its chant Better off Dead is an odd choice for a finale an would have been better served with a different placement.

Despite some minor criticisms, this is an exciting album with many more entries in the credits column than the debits.