O’Messy Life are an aptly named band. Life can get pretty messy at times, after all. Sometimes the only appropriate response is to throw your hands in the air and say sod it. If there’s one thing that stands out about their music, it’s that they don’t really seem to give a damn – and that’s by far the best thing about it.
I can see people might take that remark in the wrong spirit, so let me clarify: clearly, you don’t produce three EPs in as many years without putting in a bit of effort. Particularly not three good EPs. It’s not that the boys sound like they’re not trying; it’s that you know, deep down in your gut, they’re not trying too hard. There’s an off-hand quality to the songs that leaves them totally devoid of any pretension. If you told me that the writing/recording process consisted of nothing more than some blokes with instruments bumping into each other on a bus, deciding to have a jam, and then recording the result, I wouldn’t struggle to believe it.
What that means is that it’s almost impossible to pin down the five-piece’s sound. Sometimes they sound a bit like Sebadoh; sometimes they sound a bit like The Divine Comedy (admittedly less so since they lost the trumpet and fiddle from their line-up). It always sounds more of a happy coincidence than a premeditated agenda. If you pushed me, I’d say they were the Geordie answer to Bright Eyes [for the benefit of non-British readers, Geordies are people from Newcastle, in the north-east of England], occupying that same hazy middle-ground between alt. rock and folk. For once – I mean this quite sincerely – they manage to sound like Bright Eyes without lead singer David Littlefair doing a Conor Oberst impression.
When I asked them about their influences, they observed that they “all like Andrew WK without irony” – it’s probably good that they specified. Why do they like him? Well, because of his sweet, poetic and well thought out lyrics of course. Having never actually heard of Andrew WK, this comment was initially lost on me, but I’m glad I followed up on it (I encourage readers to do the same). They might be misanthropic gits, but O’Messy Life do have a sense of humour. That bitter whimsy comes through in their lyrics: current single “Escape Velocity” might sound like a charming little indie pop number on first listen, but given that it opens with “Me and my first love/ Planning to die young/ We’ve got stones in our pockets as we head to the lake,” that probably deserves some degree of reconsideration.
The inspiration for the single came from the cancellation of US plans for a manned mission to Mars, hence the title – the speed needed to “break free of inevitability”. It’s the first of a planned two EPs’ worth of material on the subject, which gives David plenty of opportunity to sink his nihilistic lyrical teeth into it. So far so good, although for my money B-side “Saturday Morning Cemetery” is the real gem. Still, as enjoyable as it was to hear something propulsive and energetic from the boys, they really shine when they’re at their sparsest. “Fear & Trembling”, from last year’s “The Quarter-Life Crisis Of Conan”, is a case in point: it’s a song where almost nothing actually happens, but it’s totally infectious. Plus, the title’s great – especially when you consider that it’s followed up by “The Riff Of Sisyphus”. Kierkegaard and puns on Camus? Sign me up.
You can download “Escape Velocity” via their label Tiny Lights Recordings’ Bandcamp, or head on over to their own for free downloads of their previous three EPs. If you’re super lazy, or just incredibly impatient, you can check out some of my personal favourites below.
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O’Messy Life – ”Fear & Trembling”
O’Messy Life – ”Dryads”
O’Messy Life – ”Permanent Threshold Shift Blues”
