Gomez
Split The Difference
»
Gomez
Split The Difference
Virgin, 2004
RiYL: Grateful Dead, Coldplay, Radiohead, back when they wrote songs |
Just when I had given up hope, figuring Gomez was going to be one of those all-too-common British bands that simply can't handle being successful and good at the same time, here emerges Split The Difference. And it's really good. It's doesn't have the wow, classic-from-the-first-listen feel of Bring It On, but it does rock harder. "Where Ya Going?" and "Do One" build off complicated, fuzzy riffs that guarantee you'll remember them. "Silence" has such a lovely three-part harmony on the chorus you'll be forced to learn the words to sing along. Even the more electro tracks, like the clank-and-whistle "We Don't Know Where We're Going," are an obvious improvement on their forebears from the last album.
While Ben Ottewell (the one who looks like David Herman but sounds like Howlin' Wolf) and Ian Ball (the one who looks and sounds like Ryan Adams) both take their share of the lead vocal duties, third singer Tom Gray steps more into the limelight here. While Gray nearly always sang through vocoders or distortion devices on earlier outings, "Silence" and "Catch Me Up" reveal that unadorned, Gray's modest vocal talents make a nice contrast to the more affected stylings of his bandmates.
Musically, Split The Difference wisely cuts down on the keyboard nonsense that increasingly marred records two and three. More representative are tracks like "These 3 Sins," an uptempo but mostly acoustic shuffle that rides on the marvelous, polyrhythmic drumming of Olly Peacock. Airy jam "Meet Me In The City" calls back to the first record with its kitchen-sink instrumentation and crowd vocals. "Chicken Out" begins with a four-note guitar figure deliberately reminiscent of "Sonic Reducer" then plays with the listeners' expectations by holding the full band's entry for as long as it can be tolerated. Ball's self-aware lyrics have fun with the created tension: "You call this a song? When you gonna get to it?"
Sure, Split The Difference doesn't make it all the way through without a misstep. "Extra Special Guy" is annoying, particularly considering how class the rest of the material is. I'm not sure whether the harmonies on this one are deliberately off, or whether the track is just unfinished. In any case, even the less stellar numbers on the album (and there aren't that many) are produced by Tchad Blake in a style which allows the young band members to pile on the goofy stuff while leaving the important parts unquestionably dominant in the mix.
It would be an unfair summarization to say that Gomez has found its path again by ignoring its awkward adolescence and trying to repeat the first album again. Split The Difference is informed by the experimentation and texture of the other records, it just doesn't feel dominated by them. But Gomez mustn't rest on its laurels. After managing to make its second good album, the band faces the even greater challenge of making two good albums in a row.
MARK T.R. DONOHUE | Mark T.R. Donohue is a prolific freelance writer whose areas of expertise include Rockies baseball, video games, genre television, English soccer, and pub rock. He lives in Colorado, where he cultivates the largest and creepiest private collection of Alyson Hannigan memorabilia in the Mountain West.