aaamusic | On 21, Jan 2013

Y’know how sometimes music just sounds, for lack of a better word, cool? You hear a record and you think, “my God, these guys are doing something new and amazing and I should really get on board if I want to continue hearing new and amazing stuff!”? Those are the kind of records that a music taste is built on, and currently a number of them are hurtling out of Birmingham. Previously known for bringing the world heavy metal in the form of Black Sabbath (and thank God for that), there’s currently a scene made up of bands like Peace and Swim Deep making waves under the utterly ridiculous banner of “B-Town”. I know of this because The Traps are trying really hard in their press release and in interviews to make me lump them in with the forward thinking likes of the aforementioned bands… without actually sounding all that good. It’s inoffensive enough, rattling along on a disco-y synth bass line and other assorted Casio-sounding bleeps and bloops, occasionally interrupted by bursts of guitar, but it just sounds tired. There’s all the requisite stuff that an anthemic indie disco floorshaker would need, but it sounds like the band sat down and went through all the best indie disco floorshakers of the past 10 years and tried to rip them all off simultaneously to get there, rather than because they were inspired to write a good song that came out this way. It’s pleasant background noise, but if you can hum it after you’ve heard it once, then I envy you. I can’t and I’ve heard it about six times in a row, go figure.

 

★★★★★

Will Howard