The Moldy Peaches

A case of the emperor’s new clothes anyone? Now that New York is officially ‘cool’ again, being a band from the city is a guarantee of column inches this side of the Atlantic. Would we give The Moldy Peaches time if they came from anywhere else? Maybe, maybe not.

There is much amongst the nineteen tracks that is just too knowingly absurd, too NY street hip for its own good. ‘Greyhound Bus’ is just a tuneless mess, ‘Who’s Got The Crack?’, ‘What Went Wrong’ and ‘Little Bunny Foo Foo’ equally painful. Not that they can’t rock in a lo-fi punky sort of way (‘NYC’s A Graveyard’ is a searing cocktail of the city’s musical history), but the Peaches can be surprisingly tender when they want to. ‘Jorge Regula’, ‘The Ballad Of Helenkiller And Rip Van Winkle’ and ‘Lucky Charms’ are all suffused with an allure that is only enhanced by the pair’s endearingly ramshackle duetting. Most astonishing is the positively heartbreaking ‘Nothing Came Out’, Kimya Dawson’s tale of unrequited love and the year’s most poignant song aside from REM’s ‘I’ll Take The Rain’. The strain in her voice as she sings "and besides you’re probably holding hands with some skinny, pretty girl that likes to talk about bands" is just one of those moments that stays with you long after the record has finished.

That they choose to follow it with a snotty but ultimately throwaway rockabilly song called ‘Downloading Porn With Davo’ is what makes The Moldy Peaches so fascinating but ultimately frustrating.