Sofa Surfers

Sofa Surfers rock out! With this, their fourth album, the Surfers have banished the electronics and gone to a guitar, bass, drums and vocals format that features only a single voice, that of Mani Obeya. Recorded in a "proper studio” — none of this bedroom malarkey — it certainly is well recorded, but still there’s something strange about hearing something coming from Klein that, with a different vocalist, could be the latest Death Cab For Cutie album. And that’s not to say there aren’t some good tracks here, but one can’t help thinking it’s an indulgence of the band that might not be the best thing for the record. There is a bit much of the long jamming type of stuff that might work well live but which gets a bit tiresome on disc. With this the band have effectively become another new band again, and as such need a while to figure out their sound. If they stick with this direction, the next album will be damn good, but sadly, this one is merely okay.