Speck Mountain – Summer Above

• 17th Apr 2008

Have you ever had speck on a pizza? It looks a little like pepperoni, it’s made of the same key ingredients, but it’s infinitely blander. Now imagine a musical equivalent of that blandness, only instead of just a few slices you have a whole mountain of it. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Speck Mountain.

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with Summer Above. Indeed, parts of tracks are quite good, but after listening to the inoffensive guitars and Marie-Clare Balabanian’s gentle vocals for more than about five minutes you can’t help but drift off to sleep. The album’s highlight is the mercifully short Stockholm, which offers a refreshing change from the eight minutes of boredom offered on both Girl Out West and Chlorine Fields.

There’s not much more I can say about this album except at no point should you ever consider listening to it all in one go. It’s slightly more welcoming when you hear one or two tracks at a time, but you can’t help thinking that more could have been made of the talent available.