If you’re still on the lookout for someone capable of inheriting the weighty mantle of those legendary young soul rebels Dexys Midnight Runners, then look no further: horn-heavy upstarts The Rumble Strips are here to assume that position.
If anything, some of their excitable brassy antics stumble from mere homage to flagrant impersonation; at times, too, frontman Charlie Waller mimics Kevin Rowland’s soulful timbre with an eerie precision. But – and here is the nub – you’ll likely be too busy hand-clapping, finger-clicking and caterwauling to give a hoot.
“I ain’t got no soul,” Waller may holler on the opening track, but he and his cohorts make up for such deficiencies with boundless energy, a snappy ear for a ska-flavoured tune, and a nagging ability to get a snippet of a song into the crawl-space of your cerebellum where it tends to reside happily, indefinitely. The barn-storming choruses that adorn ‘Time’, ‘Girls And Boys In Love’ and ‘Clouds’ should come with a government health warning: overtly feelgood hits of the summer like this can cause a distinct wave of good cheer to overcome anyone in the vicinity.
In different hands, the residual impact of all these sugar-coated soul numbers could leave the listener with a migraine, but The Rumble Strips' frenetic brass-fuelled pop makes light of such concerns. There is little time – or indeed need – for thought when you find yourself crooning along to ‘Oh Creole’ or the corny, but good-natured ‘Motorcycle’. Maybe it’s all been done before, but when it’s this much fun, it’s gotta be worth doing all over again.