Coburn

This album is cute, British and terrible! "National Anthem of the Coburn Republic” kicks this off, sounding like cheeky ’40s military pomp and circumstance. This matches the album art, where Pete Martin and Tim Healey of UK outfit Coburn are dressed to kill in Air Force uniforms, as well as eating bananas and smoking paper cigars. Coburn’s self-titled debut is two parts Cardigans, one part Pulp and one part UK speed garage. Pop music fans may dig this but it’s more than a little boring and lyrical depth is missing. It feels like this album goes into musical subgenres to find what’s popular and then mixes it all together into one catchy mess. Needless to say, I didn’t groove with it. Some of the Daft Punk-y beats are well put together but many of the vocals are weirdly placed. And then it goes back into boring catchiness! This album would have been much better if the artists were more focused on the music and less focused on making a hip, innovative sound.