Happy People is the second album from Worcester quartet Peace. I sort of overlooked the band on their first release having been put off a little by the hype that was being built around them by the NME – I think they're the last band I can remember to get the hard sell from the waning powers of that weekly magazine which has the potential to become a poison chalice. For example – do you remember any Viva Brother songs now? Nah, me neither, however, in the case of Peace we were amazed to see the band had booked in three nights at local Brighton venue The Haunt and quickly sold out the whole lot. It's not the first time either, I heard about them selling out four consecutive nights at Birthdays in Dalston to end their tour to support debut album In Love. There's clearly a good and growing following for Peace so I decided to investigate – is their new album as lacking in substance as the critics who have panned it say, or as era-defining as those who champion it suggest?
The album opens with easy-riding 'O You' full of tropical-sounding guitars, driving drums and bass, luscious background strings and a fine melody that breaks into a decent chorus. 'Gen Strange' is up next with a verse melody that sounds very close to Lady Madonna, although the arrangement sounds like 70's pop – say the Jackson 5? When the chorus hits it all becomes clearer – I'm sure that's Keith Richards famous bass-line from 'Sympathy For The Devil' although it's presented in such a way that all you're thinking of are the Happy Mondays or Primal Scream, it's got that baggy, acid-house flavour to it and you can tell these guys have listened to a lot of that early 90's stuff which they're accused of ripping off.
'Lost on Me' is the second single and it reminds me a bit of Mansun around the time of their first Attack of the Grey Lantern album, although I would have to say that Peace sound like they're genuinely having more fun. Another act that springs to mind are the Mystery Jets, specifically their pop-tastic Twenty One album… maybe that's the record they were touring when Peace supported them?
'Perfect Skin', arranged like a track from The Strokes début album, builds around a great hook from a pitch-shifted guitar that sounds like a synth line. When the chorus hits it's much more chaotic than expected, there's a bloated riff that rolls around the speakers while Harry Koisser whines about wishing he was taller, better looking, better dressed and so on. 'Happy People' the title track follows, with a wave of bubbly Strokes-esque guitars. It's a double bill of songs that sound, texturally and melodically like indie-giants The Strokes and also two songs that betray the angst beneath that title – they're songs of yearning that suggest everyone else is happy, not Kossier and his gang.
'Someday' is a nice change of pace, a mellow, dreamy number full of space and a good old camp-fire strummed acoustic guitar but then it doesn't take long before I start to notice how much this sounds like one of the Oasis songs where Noel Gallagher would have taken the lead vocal and that's a bit of a problem with Peace. They' write very well, the songs are full of hooks, both in the vocal melodies and the musical arrangements, but, whether they are trying to copy or not, everything sounds a little too familiar and every where the record takes me feels like deja vu.
'Money' is a bit of an edgy funk with a break-down that sounds like it could have been on The Arctic Monkeys AM, although Peace just feel like they have a slightly better sense of humour about what they're doing here – there are some great bits of vocal arrangement that just sound like the band having a laugh. 'I'm A Girl' goes right ahead and copies Elastica but then why the hell not? Elastica famously ripped off Wire all over their debut album!
'Under The Moon' is actually quite lovely and sounds like a bit of Americana presented as The Clash might have when they were somewhat ironically referencing American music on the London Calling album – the vocal though is about as far from Joe Strummer's as you could get. To my ears again Harry Koisser sounds like a melding of Blaine Harrison from The Mystery Jets and Alex Turner from Arctic Monkeys – they've even found room on this one to remind me of the melodies in Bugsy Malone. 'World Pleasure' ends the album with a sort of INXS-lite funk with a cod-rap that sounds like the sort of delivery the lads from The Mighty Boosh might conjure up. The Rolling Stones 'Sympathy For The Devil' gets another look-in for the outro of this 6 minute groover, after everything breaks down to strings, the bassline comes in confidently aiming its sights on the indie-dancefloors of tomorrow.
My review is full of more references than I've ever spotted in a band, so I am obviously quite sympathetic to the idea that Peace are not the most original band in the world. It's also true that there are some pretty cringey lyrical moments on the record, but there are equally some nice lyrical images too – like when Koisser describes himself as a 'bad computer, slow to load' on 'Happy People' or talks about wanting muscles wrapped around his bones on 'Perfect Skin'. After listening to the album a few times and reading some of the nasty reviews they've faced I can't help but find a part of myself wanting to defend Peace. I feel a bit like those that dismiss them outright are just people being a bit snobby, who are married to a musical narrative that no longer includes their style of music. They're not defining a new genre, they're not innovating with digital beats and synthesisers bleeping on every corner of the record but does everybody have to? They draw from a rich well of melodic and largely British song-writing. Okay so it's not been fashion forecast for these sounds to come back right now (except by the NME) but those 90's and Britpop nights are filling clubs up and down the country and lots of those people were not born or old enough to appreciate them first time around – if that audience is looking for something new in the same vein then Peace are the band for them.
As for the accusation they have copied the 90's too closely it seems a little short-sighted to miss the fact that Oasis, Blur and Primal Scream were dipping quite deeply into the well of The Beatles, The Kinks and The Rolling Stones themselves and what would those bands have been without the American blues artists they aped in the first place!? So Peace then – not the most original group on the planet but Happy People is better than anything Shed 7 ever produced and on this form they'll be pleasing indie kids for decades to come, keep your ears open next time you head to a Britpop night and you might well find yourself dancing to a new Peace single and not that old Primal Scream number you thought you were hearing.
Adam Kidd
Website: peaceforeverever.co.uk
Facebook: facebook.com/peaceforeverever
Twitter: twitter.com/PEACE4EVEREVER