100 years ago, a military hero took a group of boys to an island off Southampton for a weekend of exploration & adventure. If someone did that nowadays, they’d be pilloried and burnt at the stake. As a society, our innocence is lost, replaced by mistrust and consumer goods. Still, at least we got high-tech games consoles as part of the bargain. Sweet deal.
Occasionally, you do come across an isolated pocket of wide-eyed, adolescent, hormone-fuelled naivety that is as close to innocence as you get in these cynical times. Scouting For Girls are one of those pockets, filled with lint, fluffy fruit gums and pictures of ladies cut out from Janet Frazer’s lingerie section. This fulsome threesome met when they were still wee kidders (Vocalist Roy Stride was drummer Pete Ellard’s ‘sixer’ in Cub Scouts and Greg Churchouse knew Roy from primary school. Bless) but only started making tunes together in 2005. 2007 could be the year of the Wolf Cub (their fan club) for them if they can continue to make singles of the same high calibre as their debut, ‘She’s So Lovely.’
With all the urgency of a premature ejaculation, the song explodes into being with a flurry of handclaps, bass and vamped Kate Nash pianoforte. “I like the way she fills her clothes,” leers Roy, “she looks just like the girls in vogue.” Brash, illusory, eager and… sweet, really. Roy continues to pound his way on the piano through the four line verse full of Benny Hill subtlety, before pausing momentarily to gather momentum for the brain worm of a chorus. “She’s so lovely!” Repeat until you get the idea. This is the point that you’ll probably think “Crowded House? Without the edge?” Okay, it is undeniably simple pop fare, but it has the flags of the world up its sleeves. Listen.
Hot on the heels of the chorus comes the bridge, hot blooded and similarly unsubtle: “she’s flirty/and thirty/ ain’t that the age a girl gets really dirty?” Roy questions, perpetuating the myth of the older woman. Then, as it all gets a bit much, a second, more contemplative bridge carries the song and we’re into the chorus again. Four simple sound-bites, slid about willy-nilly to convey the chaotic exuberance of fantasy and infatuation coupled with bashful hesitation and self-doubt. And on top of that structural complexity, it still maintains its pop simplicity – check out those school yard couplets and triplets – but not by wallowing in musical condescension.
I know I’ve banged on about it, but I’m stating a case, because I know there are those out there who will dismiss this as a Pigeon Detectives-a-like on first hearing. Give it a few more hearings and you’ll realise it’s not as crass or ladsy as those… people; it’s a lot nicer, sweeter and a hell of a lot more fun. Be prepared for a whole lot more.
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