Circa Waves – Young Chasers (Album Review)

Circa Waves are a four-piece indie rock band from Liverpool. The band released their debut album called Young Chasers on the 30^th of March in 2015. Considering the quartet only formed in 2013, their fan-base has been rapidly expanding on the indie scene. I thought I’d give them a review considering they have been all over my Instagram feed recently, and I have never actually thought about giving them a listen before-hand.

'Get Away' – Introduces the whole album with a competitive strong start, getting you excited for what’s next to come. The track introduces itself with a strong guitar and drums, followed shortly by the vocals. The whole album appears very summery and is the sort of album that a big group of lads would listen to, with a crate of beers in the garden or on a field. This song is about someone with a very insecure partner and they want to do anything to make them happy for example the chorus states;

“I could get away if I wanted to, my hands are tied – tied to you, but I don’t mind no.”

In other words, they could leave and abandon their partner if they wanted to, but they don’t want to; due to having such a strong love for this person no matter what their insecurities.

'T-Shirt Weather' - Has a crescendo within the entrance of the song getting louder, with prompt vocals following the intense introduction. The track is ever so contagious due to the repetitive chorus;

“I remember T-shirt weather; I remember some days we were singing our lungs out in the backseat together.”

The contagiousness comes from the cleverly structured rhyming within the chorus, which is presumably why it is their most notorious and well-known song.

'Deserve This' –This song sounds a bit softer than their previous material as it does not enter with sharp drums and guitar, shortly followed by vocals; their usual structure. This song could have two meanings; one whereby he’s referring to the fact that he does not deserve all of the good things that have happened to him as he is reminiscing the good times. However it could also mean he does not deserve her leaving him?

“I haven’t seen her then, but I’ll only love her to chase a dream; I miss you.”

'Young Chasers' – Starts with an energetic guitar and drum introduction with an upbeat tone of voice, Kieran Shudall on main vocals has a very easy-going rhythmic voice. You can almost imagine fans jumping up, down and sideways to their energetic and fun-filled song.

'Good For Me' – Shudall sounds so much like Julian Casablancas in this track and the song sounds heavily influenced by The Strokes. I think this is due to how there is only a few strings played on the guitar at first, and then it goes into a very heavy and fast beat, it escalates very quickly – a lot like The Strokes’ work. This track sounds like he’s just trying to tell someone he cares about them as it is basically inevitable that he will be a bad influence on them, as he says how he’s a bad influence on himself –

“You’ll see, yeah you’ll see that I’m just no good for me”

'Stuck in my Teeth' – This song sounds very heavily influenced by The Kooks right from the instrumental, straight through to the lyrics and vocals.  The song is ever so catchy due to its repetitiveness on the main line;

“I’m a little too young with not enough time.”

I suppose considering the fan base would be teenagers to young adults, Circa Waves are very relate-able and perhaps that’s why their fan base has increased so rapidly?

In conclusion I really like Circa Waves, and I can understand why their fan base may have expanded so rapidly. However, for me personally this album was not enough. There was not enough variety throughout the album as most of the songs sound very similar and I like albums whereby they have a song which is a complete paradox from the rest of the album. The closest to a paradox that the album has would be ‘Deserve this’ so on that behalf I was rather disappointed. I think Circa Waves sound heavily influenced by The Kooks and The Strokes which is never a bad thing as I love them both; how can you not?! However, if anyone begs to differ; please don’t be afraid to share your opinion with me! I’d love to know if there was more depth to the album than love, girls and sun?

P.S - I apologise for not posting over the past fortnight I've been ever so busy with revision.

7/10