People from Leicester have probably heard it all before; known for crisps, Gary Linekar, erm... Gary Linekar eating crisps...and Kasabian? Well it's not a great record but 5 piece electronic shoegazers Kyte have been causing quite a fuss, so it's left to their debut album Dead Waves to see if the ado is justified. Fronted by the aptly named Nick Moon on vocals there is a space-age polish to the dreaminess although it's the gravity free interior of the shuttle rather than the flame that propels it.The opening of the title track shows just how pretty they can be ”“ a sea of flickering electronics, synthetic strings and chiming glockenspiel sit below Moon's vocals that are happy to remain a part of the whole while 'Strangest Words and Pictures' manages to emanate a strangely soothing tranquility. However the whole of Dead Waves is permeated by a tendency to the clinical and over-precise. Moon's heavily processed vocals are a key to this and seem to sit above the music and survey everything else while never really connecting with the soundscapes his bandmates conjure.It may seem unreasonable for an accomplished vocalist to be pointed at as the downfall of a record but it is the sheer dominance of restraint and the lack of emotion that leaves the performances as the weak link. These aren't charmingly robotic like Kraftwerk, more just lacking the humanity or venom that the lyrics demand. On this note it is worth mentioning that it may have been interesting to see how the album sounded with less extreme vocal processing and that while Moon is to blame for the lack of conviction, his vocals could have been given a more interesting context if the music wasn't so sanitised and lacking in tension.This debut is too often happy to sit in it's own bubble ”“ never brave enough or in possession of enough bite to reach out and touch you and this has the effect of making the beauty that shines in moments too artificial when displayed over an extended period. As such then the record stands as somewhat of a missed opportunity, leaving you with a nagging sense that these songs are less than the sum of their parts and when placed alongside the better records we've heard this year alone it's a disappointing, frustrating listen from a band that clearly have much potential.