Piskie Sits are an outfit steeped in endearing whimsy and quirkiness. Everything from their name, the album title, to the song titles (Feat. Pharrell Williams, Young Dumb And Full Of It, Always The Crap Songs, to name but a few) and most of all, the way that on ‘Creature Feature’, they wear both their hearts, and their influences, on their sleeves.
Right from the opening track I Know And You’ll Know, we’re treated to a vocal that calls to mind Stephen Malkmus’ tired croon, the notes he’s almost reaching dangle just in front of him like a carrot on a stick, so close he can just about get a taste, which is all he really wants anyway. This is something that becomes all the more evident on tracks later on in the album, especially on Family Tree, Young Dumb And Full Of It and Victoria Plzen.
Unlike Malkmus’ best known vehicle Pavement, however, Piskie Sits offer up a sharp, clean, catchy sound. While indebted to the ’90s American lo-fi scene, they owe just as much to the likes of post-Britpop, garage rock/post-punk revivalists Razorlight and The Kooks. I Know And You’ll Know builds to an infectious, shout-along crescendo (“It’s true/I’m watching you/It’s all I do/There’s no other thing”), while Young Dumb And Full Of It opens with an riff that sounds almost like a major key rewrite of the Kooks’ indie floorfiller Naive.
On tracks like Waiting For The Dance Of Death, Piskie Sits really come into their own. Meticulously well-arranged, the track switches from high-low octave chords to tasteful fingerpicking backed up by bursts of lightning speed tremolo guitar. The rhythm section ensures that both guitars stick to a walking pace and the keys add an extra element of fun. The “ooh-ahh” backup vocals are as irresistible as you’d be used to from any radio rock band with an ear for a good hook.
In closing track Solitary Late Nite Drinker, ‘Creature Feature’ fails to offer any real sense of closure, and the album seems a little too short. But overall it displays a certain brand of British-influenced-American-influenced British pop rock that sounds familiar, yet not so derivative that it’s neither refreshing or charming. Piskie Sits show themselves to be good in the same way their beloved Pavement and The Strokes are; they’re not virtuosos and they’re not going to set the world on fire, but they’re not trying to anyway, so there’s nothing left but to simply enjoy the music.