F
F
Morticia
Crap, I don’t know how a band expects to be easy to learn more about with such a ridiculous band name. Oh well, I was able to learn a little bit about these guys at their Web site, so poo on them! F, which also happens to be the moniker of the band’s lead singer, play 1980s-style gloomy power pop, which could be likened to New Order and, dare I say it, The Cure. The Cure is my all time favorite band, so it’s hard to accept a band that copies them, but F actually do it fairly well.
The singer, thank God, doesn’t try to sound like Robert Smith, but the way the band structures their songs, the guitar melodies they use, the way their instruments sound, all of it builds up to a “yes, they do kind of sound like The Cure.” The thing is though, they sound just as much like The Replacements, so go figure.
The entire album harkens back to the 1980s, and not the overplayed synth side of things, but the cool music, which used to be called “progressive” (that was the term that was used for weird people and weird music before “alternative” was used, for you younger readers out there). Songs like “Uber Dub” made me a true believer in F. On this track, the lead singer sounds like Bono, the drums are fast and up beat, sounding very much like New Order drums (the fast double high hat work in full force). This song totally rocks, but a strange ticking sound, not intentional by the band, was quite annoying, and obviously an error in production.
Fans of The Cure only get a new record every three or four years, so we’ve got to find things to enjoy while we wait. As one fan to another, I would like to suggest F as something that fans will enjoy… really! Fans of early U2, and early New Order will enjoy this, as well.
