For those who consider popular music these days to be largely inconsequential and ephemeral, we've good news: GoodBooks have arrived, and they bring with them much invigorating roughage.
A young four piece, singer Max Cooke, bassist Christopher Porter, keyboardist JP Duncan, and drummer Leo von Bulow-Quirk, all aged between 21-22 - each felt similarly motivated and, two years ago, they convened together in a studio for the first time to run through a cursory rehearsal and ended up writing a song together, then another, and then another still. Buoyed with a roller coasting sense of momentum, they were suddenly up and running with a musical skill and maturity that belied their tender years.
Like REM before them, GoodBooks blend vigorously unlinear melodies with an unusually thoughtful lyrical slant; they are a modern day rarity: an outfit to sit up and listen to. There is depth here, and plenty of it.
It is safe to assume that GoodBooks' lyrical inspirations run deeper than just love, drugs and sex. On their forthcoming debut album Control, GoodBooks comfortably establish themselves as the most arresting and idiosyncratic new band of 2007. They have the angular intrigue of that great-lost art rock act The Auteurs, coupled with the nervy eclecticism of Talking Heads at their peak. They write profound and involving songs inspired by Kafka, terrorism, the Bible and - why not? lesbian crushes, while musically their rhythms are sinuous and kinetic, with mournful trumpets and clattering, vivid percussion.
Available for DJ sets.
