A little glimpse into how my mind works – you know when you get news stories about Pete Doherty, and the press talk about his house being raided in the early hours by the fuzz, or you hear about bands like Mystery Jets having parties until dawn at their house on Eel Pie Island. Well, I don’t think – “well, that’s enormously exciting, how rock and roll those fellows must be”. I just think “blimey, I’m glad I don’t live next door to them”. And that is precisely the thought that crossed my mind when I listened to the latest album by Celebration. If her performance on The Modern Tribe is anything to go by, lead singer Katrina Ford sounds like the sort of person who you’d hear clearly through the party wall, squealing with delight every time the postman calls or a fresh packet of custard creams is cracked open. I’m not saying this is a bad thing – it sounds good on record and her exuberance adds much to these songs. I’m just saying that I wouldn’t want to live next door to her.

Thankfully, the chances of this are small, as I live in sleepy old England and have no plans to move to Baltimore, where Celebration hail from. They are a three piece – Katrina and her multi-instrumentalist husband Sean Antanaitis, with David Bergander on drums. Although they are signed to 4AD, they sound like the kind of band who would have been very much at home on label One Little Indian in the early nineties. Back then, O.L.I. had a real knack of signing interesting, female fronted bands, most notably The Sugarcubes, but also the rather po-faced Heartthrobs and Danielle Dax, an artist that really springs to mind when listening to Celebration.

And it starts with a wonderful song – “Evergreen” is tremendous, full of life-affirming lyrics set to a scattergun of drums and cymbal crashes, whilst organ swirls around in the background. “Pressure” is also good, reminiscent of Moloko with understated vocals and handclaps, set against another strident organ sound. It’s an engaging piece of music building in a suffocating fashion as it closes in around you. “Fly the Fly” is also strong, full of furiously strummed guitar. The highlight though is “Tame The Savage”, a stuttering pop song with a fine vocal performance from Katrina and a rich array of keyboards and guitars providing the backing.

There are moments however that miss the mark. “Hands Off My Gold” judders with stabs of brass but fails to go anywhere, whilst latter tracks like “Wild Cats”, “Comets” and “In This Land” don’t do anything that hasn’t already been explored in the earlier half of the album. In ends well though, with “Our Hearts Don’t Change”, the pace quickened as the song (and the album) reaches a frenzied conclusion. Occasionally this album is a little too theatrical for my tastes, but it certainly offers something different. Whilst I am not looking at property in Baltimore just yet, I shall certainly be interested to see what Celebration come up with next.
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Links
Celebration [official site] [myspace] [buy it]