Revisionism is all the rage in 2009. If a new band manages to reinterpret a particular sound of yesteryear without sounding or looking like a bad cover act, it's deemed a relative success. If they manage to replicate that sound while simultaneously adding a new facet of their own to it, all the better.
Thankfully, London duo The Big Pink fall into the latter category. Although a lot of 'A Brief History of Love' is brazenly in thrall to shoegaze bands like The Jesus and Mary Chain and Ride, and dashes of early '90s psychedelia straight out of 'Screamadelica', Milo Cordell and Robbie Furze have written (and produced) a rather tasty debut. Their layering effect works brilliantly on atmospheric opener 'Crystal Visions' and the title track, both songs that explode into crunchy, grimy shuffles that blow through your eardrums like a screaming gust of wind. 'Too Young to Love' and the brilliant 'Golden Pendulum' tread a trancier path and could pass for a dancefloor filler at the Hacienda's heyday, while 'At War With the Sun''s floaty backing vocals work nicely against its heavy, C86-style guitars.
It's true, too, that 'A Brief History of Love' occasionally veers off course and into pastiche, specifically on the laddish electronica-doused 'Tonight' and on the swaggering Kasabian-esque rock of 'Dominos'. Nevertheless, as a debut album, it's a chiefly enjoyable listening experience. Will The Big Pink wring another album out of this sound, or will they force themselves onwards to pastures new? Chinks of innovation heard here would suggest the latter, but we'll just have to wait and see whether the duo's songwriting history is as brief as their love-stricken one.
