A Gigantic Raft

The Raft
Genre: Pop From: Wirral, United Kingdom

The Raft hail from the Wirral (or over de water as us scousers say) but, on new album 'Random Recordings' they sound like they've been on a magical mystery tour around the indie hotspots of the UK.

'Nobody Does It Better' sounds so much like 'Champagne Supernova' that Noel would be in his rights to demand a co-writers credit while 'You've Been Waiting' wouldn't have sounded out of place as a b-side to the Stone Roses 'Sally Cinnamon'. It's not all Madchester and lads rock though 'Don Quixote' is reminiscent of the Field Mice at their best, 'He' is the point at which The Sundays become Belle & Sebastian and if you close your eyes you'd swear that 'Hey Green Eyes' was The Bluetones.

So far so indie by numbers. But just as you're beginning to tire of playing guess the influence it gets really really wierd with final track 'Feel So Young' which starts as one of those light and airy summer pop songs that Dodgy used to knock out in their lunch hour before twisting into a wierd Tolkien rant that Rick Wakeman would have rejected as a little too pretentious. It does, however, elevate the track well above the mundane and leads to a diverting game of guess the drugs ingested during the recording.

Overall the Raft sound like the band that time forgot, a band for whom it's still 1995 and Oasis and Blur are slugging it out for the crown of best Britpop band, a band that realise a decent tune is timeless. 'Random Recordings' may be a little derivative and not the most original album you'll hear all year but when did originality become the yardstick to measure music? All I can say is that, unlike a lot of albums by so called critics favourites, 'Random Recordings' has hardly been off my CD player since I received it and that's what counts.

Go Try

MP3 - The Raft - Feel So Young
MP3 - The Raft - Nobody Does It Better

Go Buy








Send a message to the band's myspace site for details on how to buy the album

Go Visit

The Raft - Myspace