polaroids of androids

The Vasco Era leave me more torn than Laura Imbruglia's older and less talented sister. One moment they feed me jaw-dropping songs like the opener When It All First Showed Up which, although massively overplayed by the radio stations, still sounds like a solid kick in the nut sack with steal cap boots. They then kill me with the painfully slow nature of songs like When We Tried To Party To Forget About It. I don't mind a ballad, but the lyrics sound like they were written by a retarded seven year old. It drags on for almost five whole minutes and murders the high tempo mood of the album. Something that it never really recovers from.

For the most part this album treads incredibly close to being a hybrid between the two most successful Australian rock bands of the last couple of years. At times the vocals sound similar to Craig Nicholls at his wildest and most emotional. The recycled and overdone guitar work sounds much like work of dirty pop darlings Jet. At times it's just plain cockout rock. A music-by-numbers approach that is predictable and ends up sounding like a bunch of previously successful formulas thrown together in the hope that something will work.

At their finest moments - the previously mentioned opening track and first single, as well as Honey Bee (When It Was Making Weird Love Songs) and When We All Lost It The Vasco Era show they are a group capable of making - although not groundbreaking - at least entertaining rock music. When in the right mood this album and all of it's controlled commercial wildnesss is enjoyable. But it lacks the substance and originality to be something that will be listener more than a couple of times before listening only to the handful of highlights.