Featuring the combined talents of Snow Patrol's Gary Lightbody, REM's Peter Buck and Belle and Sebastian's Richard Colburn (as well as Iain Archer and Jacknife Lee) Tired Pony's initial offering is a beautiful piece of work that not only manages to sound like the sum of its parts, but also a brand new entity entirely. Coming off like a nu-Travelling Wilburys (ask your dad) the band's Americana sound on 'Dead American Writers', 'Point Me At The Lost Islands' and 'That Silver Necklace' is bewitching and the ghosts of Whiskeytown and Mazzy Star haunt the record for all of its ten tracks.
Despite boasting an already A-list line-up, She & Him's Zooey Deschanel makes an appearance on the waltzing 'Get On The Road,' too, but it's Editor's Tom Smith who steals the show, lending his melodramatic baritone to the life-affirming yet bruised and battered 'The Good Book'. With only a couple of throwaway tracks on the record (the meandering 'The Deepest Ocean There Is' is forgettable and the distorted, discordant guitars sound out of place on album-closer 'Pieces') Tired Pony sound more like thoroughbreds than the old nags implied by the name. This reviewer, for one, can't wait to see where this project goes from here.