Tag: Apollo 5

Apollo 5 – Too Close To The Sun

“The clap.”

Tim: Second track of this lot, and I’m sorry to have to warn you that they’ve chosen this moment to break out the ukulele.

Tom: And the clap, it would seem. Sorry, the claps.

Tim: And DAMMIT I hate that this song makes me really happy. I HATE ukuleles. I LOATHE the stupid guitar foetus things that make frown men look like they’re giants strumming an ant. I DESPISE everything about them, the fake chirpy optimism they never fail to signify, and the general irritation that a single strum creates in me.

Tom: Mm. See, given this is the second ukulele song in a week where you’ve enjoyed it, I’m starting to question that.

Tim: Well, that brings me on to the most of all: I UTTERLY ABHOR the fact that in many cases…it works. Because I’m listening to this and despite it being the most appallingly twee song we’ve heard in months, especially once you add in the clapping–

Tom: Just call it the Clap.

Tim: I still have a smile on my face. Every time that chorus comes around, I’m smiling like the sodding Cheshire Cat.

Tom: I was about to say “if it’s any consolation, Tim, it pretty much completely unaffects me,” but then it did that bridge on the way back from the middle eight and I found myself quietly nodding my head along with it.

Tim: Bastards, all of them.

Apollo 5 – Famous

“They should have dressed up as chickens.”

Tim: I feel like I write this at least every six, but: new Swedish boyband for you.

Tom: With a name that’s not googlable at the moment. They should have dressed up as chickens instead and called it… Pollo 5.

Tim: I feel I should do something violent with my hands…it’s either clap or slap, I’m not sure which.

But as ever, we’ll save the names for if and when the second track arrives, because there’s no point putting effort in unnecessarily, but here’s the debut track for now.

Tim: Though despite all my snark at the top, this is a perfectly decent track to launch a career off.

Tom: Mm. The thing is “perfectly decent” isn’t enough. McFly had 5 Colours; One Direction had What Makes You Beautiful. This isn’t in that league. This isn’t anywhere near that league. This is barely playing three leagues down — well, you know, that metaphor’s gone far enough now.

That said: these guys appear to be using the modern “slow launch on YouTube” approach, rather than the “splashy first single and marketing” approach, so who knows?

Tim: There’s not that much interesting to be said about it, to be honest – standard verse, decent chorus, happy fare at the end with optimism throughout.

Tom: Whoa, optimism? We got a completely different feeling off the track. This sounds melancholy and lonely to me: it’s a post-breakup song with an air of “screw you” to it.

Tim: Oh, yes, it has a massive air of “screw you”, but it’s an air given from a higher place, looking down with an almost gloating “I’m amazing, sucks to be you” vibe, especially with that “I know, I know, I know, I know, you’ll never do better” line. It’s an incredibly harsh and dickish form of optimism, but it’s definitely there.

And an album of this calibre would be entirely welcome. Let’s hope I do get to introduce them properly.