From Iceland — Telepathetics - Ambulance

Published July 28, 2006

Give the Telepathetics credit for two things off the bat: an amusing name, and a huge amount of creative energy – meaning they are trying very hard to be creative, not that they are investing a huge amount of interest or intelligence into the creativity. The jumps in rhythm, balanced by ultra-smooth production, have the effect of pouring pop rocks into your ears with a Coke chaser, which is something. But the melodies aren’t all that good; the drums, which seem crisp at first, get repetitive by track 3, the lyrics are stone-cold dumb, all the worse for the perfect production, and for the slight slur that frontman Eyþór suffers from. A press release claimed Telepathetics were a big discovery for an over-the-hill English producer. When you hear that, you can expect a Radiohead rip off, and we get a good portion of that with Ambulance, though with a dash of garage band incompetence. Somehow, the little flaws, and especially the lyrics through highly mixed vocals, fully undo this record: There is no track that can be played twice. In fact, none that can be listened to all the way through. Every song starts with a good chord, a hint at good pop rhythm, and then it falters. Which means that this is bad, even by next-big-thing-in-Britain standards. Hopefully, they’ll recover and take some time away from the studio. BC