'Learning is fun with the Loungs' EP reviewed by William Barnes

HOW do you review a record that's practically become a part of you? If I were to try to review, say, Pet Sounds, Odyssey and Oracle, or Abbey Road, I frankly couldn't, because it would read like Q Magazine fanboy waffle.

I fear that to review the new Loungs EP would be a similar exercise in futility. When I started this review, having only had it for juts over 24 hours, it was already hard-wired into my mind, soul and heart. But anyway, I must try, if only to get Dan The Loung to stop pestering me.

'Smile Reptile' begins with Jamie singing alone with his guitar in Robert Johnson-esque lo-fi, which soon slides beneath a hi-fi recorded Jamie, and then Wills' trademark squiggly synth whistling thing. The rest of the band join in and they strum along merrily for another minute or so, before making way for the Wills-sung 'All Your Love'.

Beginning in Beatles circa 1967 style time, it's a quirky two-speeder, with the aforementioned quiet bit and a faster 'The Loungs go wild in Tijuana' bit with 'la la las' and what sounds like about 18 multi-tracked Loungs. (The song also features members of Giant Root Attack and The Ups). It's in the last 45 seconds or so that it really becomes something else, with several multi-tracked Wills repeating "I've had a taste of my life on the tide", mantra-like, over a choir of hundreds of Loungs.

It becomes increasingly obvious that The Loungs have sidestepped the rather obvious late period Lennon/McCartney so beloved of Noel Gallagher et al, and instead decided to have a go at their own mini-version of SmiLE. And it's fantastic.

Jamie takes the lead vocal again in 'I Never Knew', a somewhat subdued tune carried along by a jaunty piano. It's pleasant enough and refreshingly light after the immense 'All Your Love'. I found the tune wandering around my head one afternoon, whilst taking a break from my computer (where the EP is currently living).

Track four, the Paul Nic penned 'Western Bloods' is a panpipe assisted spaghetti Western style tune that goes along nicely, then stops. Maybe the track by track approach is the wrong way to conduct this review- the songs are all good, but it's as much the progression of songs that makes the EP so...so....yeah. That said, the EP's closing track, 'In Winter Coats' is a fantastic smoochy number from Mr Wills, detailing "glitches and rings on mobile phones," (amongst other things) that would sound good no matter what order it was in. It's the 'Caroline, No' of the EP and brings things to a nigh-on perfect end.

(The EP is available from Kaleidoscope Records for £3)