The View

Album review

Cheeky For A Reason

added: 11 Jul 2012 // release date: 2 Jul 2012 // label: Cooking Vinyl
reviewer: David Spencer

Printable version

Coming less than eighteen months after their last release Dundee�s The View issue their fourth album, Cheeky For A Reason, and although it is a short period between the records, there appears to have been quite a change � and not only in record label. 2011�s Bread & Circuses surprised a few people and maybe alienated a few fans, with its more polished slightly poppy feel. As the band�s least successful album there was bound to be a reaction against it and here The View return to the sound that earned them as Mercury Prize nomination with their debut.

Cheeky For A Reason is a nod towards that obligatory air of cockyness that rock stars feel they need to display. And singer/guitarist Kyle Falconer is never short of confidence. In fact the opening few tracks ride out like a statement of intent to say the man behind that energetic and promising debut is still alive and well.

How Long, AB (We Need Treatment) and Hold On Now are all delivered with a swift Scottish swagger, with impressive guitar hooks and catchy tunes. If anything there is a seventies feel, with a touch of The Faces and more accessible punk littered across the likes of Hold On Now, with its lads sung chorus. That is certainly a more accurate guide than Falconer�s. When he was asked about the album he said �its Fleetwood Mac�s Rumours done by The Clash�. Now there is a thought.

Anfield Row, Bullet and Bunker fill the middle section of the album, where the whoo-whoo�s and all-band sung choruses start to irritate. The Clock shakes it up with supremely catchy hooks and the cracking line �I never say something that I didn�t mean, unless I�m being mean�. Most, if not all, will sound great live on the band�s forthcoming tour, while mobile phones will appear if they play piano led ballad Tacky Tattoo in the set.

The album was recorded at Liverpool�s Motor Museum Studios with producer Mike Crossey, who has worked with other British rock hopes Arctic Monkeys and Razorlight. While Alex Turner is in a different league as far as songwriting and British rock music is considered, it might just be that The View are once again back in the chasing pack.

Stay updated with your free Music News daily newsletter. Subscribe here now!

Have Your Say