Los
Campesinos! are a breath of fresh air in a South Wales scene dominated by spindly
rawkers aping Iron Maiden while gargling rusty nails. It’s British indie
music with a slant; tangential guitar melodies bedding down in a male-female
vocal dialogue. Despite being young, new and fresh this Cardiff student seven-piece
seem to have an innate ability for a light but effective touch to writing pop
music, and it’s this which has got chequebook-waving A&R men excited.
American alt-rockers like Pavement, Dinosaur Jr and The Flaming Lips provide
discernable inspiration in the fuzzy guitar structures, but there’s a
Britishness - almost overwrought - to Gareth’s vocals. But just when
his nasal tones threaten to get all Libertines-esque faux Lahndan, the girls’ vocals
come in and sweeten things up. The reason why Los Campesinos! are as hot as
they are though, is the sheer ‘pop’ of their songs - no matter
how wilfully indie they are, there’s always a potential hit single in
there somewhere. (www.myspace.com/loscampesinos)James MacLaren
