There was nothing particularly new or fast about them but still… here’s The Automatic… with daffodils.

When digging around in the darker corners of clunky old laptops and trodden-on memory sticks for pieces of writing to repost on this blog, I was a little surprised to be reminded I gave a hugely complimentary review to the second album by The Automatic.

Y’know… that lot that did; ‘What’s that coming over the hill? Is it a Monster?’,  the song everybody remembers them for and one I personally never liked. In fact, I thought it was intensely annoying.

Nevertheless, I got sent the album in the post and liked it (still do, listening back to it again) so I’m not going to pretend otherwise. It also had me flicking through the ‘where are they now?’ files. What do flash-in-the-pan indie bands do after their time has been called.

The album reviewed below was beset by distribution problems brought about as the result of a dispute between their label, B-Unique and its parent label, Polydor. Their third and final album was released independently and, as detailed here, it turns out their frontman decided to learn some languages, including Esperanto, and study computer science at Cardiff Uni as a mature student.

Phew! Rock ‘n’ Roll, eh…?

The Automatic- This Is A Fix (Polydor/B-Unique)

If we must insist on living by categorisation, I’m not too sure into which camp I should place The Automatic. As a U.K. indie act, they fall somewhere between the laddish, fist-banging terrace-indie brigade and the sweeter, more sequencer-happy electro pop favoured by other, more thoughtful souls. The album was recorded in Los Angeles with Butch Walker (Fall Out Boy, All American Rejects, Simple Plan) which might explain why, to certain ears, it may also resemble some of the catchier, more pop-literate US pop-punk/emo bands (but Christ knows there’s enough of those doing the rounds without the Brits adding to the infernal deluge).

I’d heard the first Automatic album ‘Not Accepted Anywhere’, several times while working instore at HMV and was never that impressed, so I was preparing to digest to this with a heavy, largely unmoved heart. As it turns out, the tunes bash along at a nice, rowdy pace and have enough hooky power-chord changes and catchy choruses to grab your attention over their collective clatter. Iwan Griffiths (they’re Welsh, as you might’ve guessed), their bolshy, ‘no-frills’ drummer purrs out a different rhythmic approach on each track too, ensuring their limiting distorto-rock style doesn’t result in them sounding too humdrum.

Most tracks make their stamp on you in some way another. The majority are brash and loud but ‘Magazines’ dead rings for the expansive technoid-rock of MGMT and ‘This Is A Fix’ and ‘Accessories’ feature some powerfully wrought, high-registering vocals from bassist and singer, Robin Hawkins. I really was expecting to be rendered unimpressed by this. A difficult second album by a band unloved by many whose previous best was some fairly lame, childish tosh about an oncoming monster. It’s a marked improvement from their first, though and provides the same kind of balls-out, unashamed power-pop thrills that made We Are Scientists’ first album such a winner.

Some tracks do make you wonder if they’re annoyingly poppy or just pretty damn good. ‘This Ship’ begins with an awful, overblown American teen-pop feel but, further in, scampering along at a breathless pace, it boasts a winning, more downbeat sequence of what seem to be three different consecutive choruses, such is the song’s catchiness quotient. The plodding, mawkish ‘Make Your Mistakes’ is an unwelcome half-ballad that irritates rather than improves as it unfolds and if in the wrong mood, you could obviously dismiss this album as being formulaic indie-rock ear-candy.

Generally, though, with your glossy, plasticky ‘Saturday night out’ head on, you’d have to concede this is a fine pop album by a band blessed with a keen ear for no-brain ‘singalongability’ but with enough chunky garage band punch to ensure they don’t stray too far into over-produced McFly or Killers territory.

I must admit, too that I’m surprised The Automatic haven’t got a wider profile. They rock harder and bash out tunes with twice the insidious pop hooks of B-Unique label-mates, Kaiser Chiefs and they’re a little easier to take seriously as a band with enough creativity in the bank to stick around for a while and continue winning admirers.

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Mmmmm…. shows what I know about ten-a-penny indie-rock outfits. It’s also quite telling that the only single from the album, ‘Steve McQueen’, was probably my least favourite track….

It’s probably a good thing I don’t work as talent-spotting A&R man.