Sons & Daughters - This Gift
(Domino)
Produced by: Bernard Butler
http://www.sonsanddaughtersloveyou.com

Glasgow’s Sons and Daughters are a typical Domino band, producing intelligent indie pop and wearing its cultural influences on its sleeve. Maybe basing songs on things like Billy Liar, Cathy Come Home and Emily Dickinson poems could be seen as a little bit pretentious, but this is a loveable album with a big sound.

Produced by Bernard Butler, there is a clarity to the sound of This Gift, driven as much by Adele Bethel’s winning vocals as it is by a beefed-up rhythm section. This album comes off like a daft sixties dance party for the iPod generation. The Nest pulls of a Phil Spector-ish trick, led as it is by a Ronnettes drum beat, whilst Chains could have even have been recorded by Lulu once upon a time. Darling comes off sounding like Iggy Pop’s Some Weird Sin. Like all good pop records, This Gift manages to sound derivative and fresh, all at the same time.

Most importantly, This Gift sounds like a band having a lot of fun. Following the clichéd philosophy ‘smile and the world smiles with you’, this comes off an absolute treat. There’s nothing here that will change the world, just a very good band putting out a very good record. Not much wrong with that.

Tom Sutton