Probably no one here will remember The Dawn Parade, I know I’d never heard of them before, but they had the John Peel seal of approval which has always been a good pointer. Well, The Dawn Parade evolved into The Visions and have now recorded another debut album with a few of the old Dawn Parade songs reworked to fit with the newer tracks.
Laurence Olivier’s Henry V during Morrissey’s Tongue tells you everything about how English this album is. It may also hint at the epic romance poetry the lyrics aspire to. Morrissey is a good name check I reckon, and then throw in almost any stadium filling English indie pop rock act from the eighties to yesterday and you’ll cover the influences here. Mark Radcliffe first played them sandwiched between The Smiths & The Beatles but I’ll maybe throw in wee Welsh shades of The Alarm & The Manics for some guitars and occasional vocals change as a jaunt away from their very Cambridge roots.
It all sounds very nice and polished which will be down to producer Chris Brown (Radiohead, Muse) but I fear they’ve decided on “epic” as being a goal and have used every formula in the book to achieve that, on the first listen I was predicting exactly where the guitars would go and just when the strings would appear to lift the sound to the anthemic chorus of each and every song. Don’t get me wrong Greg Macdonald has done a very fine job writing this stuff and if you like it then I guess you’ll love it, otherwise it’s a definite case of “meh” and will be all too easily forgotten by me before lunchtime.
I expect, though, that if I’d just seen The Visions closing 3rd stage festival tent I’d be raving to you about how your folly of seeing the over-hyped main stage headliners had meant you’d missed the best band in the history of the world. But they haven’t managed to get the raw rock hinted at across here often enough. If I’m ever in Cambridge I’d love to go see a gig full of their fans but until then, maybe one more listen to Good Luck Olivia and singalong to the chorus of Into the Nightlife and maybe accidentally leave the album on repeat a couple of times. That’s the problem with such by-the-rules songwriting, dozens of other tunes have already planted the hooks in my head, I’m tricked into feeling I’ve known and loved these songs for years—I grew up with this album before it was ever written. I don’t want to like it. I don’t want to admit I like it. So just one and only one more listen.
The Visions are currently unsigned but Morrissey’s Tongue is tentatively scheduled for an early summer release as the first single from Into the Nightlife.
