Live Review

The Automatic – O2 Academy, Liverpool

• 28th Apr 2010

Straight Lines walked on stage to the childrens’ TV theme-esque tune that kept repeating the bands name. I’d never heard this before but it was friendly, retro, and catchy, like all such tunes are. Without saying a word to the crowd, they went sraight into thier set.

Finally they spoke after their 2nd tune, in a Welsh accent. I thought they could be another good band from the breed of great Welsh groups over the years. I wan’t disappointed. They appeared to be ‘nice boys’ also, confident but without obious signs of ego. Very down-to-earth. I met the drummer, Dane and asked him for a set list five minutes before they were due to perform, and he politely had the time for me in saying said that it wasn’t written yet!

Apologies I don’t know the names of the tunes, but don’t let that put you off.

Thier songs were all well constructed with good chord changes, melodies and harmonies. Very tight-knit and well disciplined in their playing but still giving out some innocent youth energy. The single ‘Runaway Now’ had that catchy “Sha-la-la-la-la” like many singles have to be for a new band, but fair enough. You should be grateful to be introduced to this band.

The last tune I felt was their ‘anthem’, repeated singing of “Little Hope Will Carry Me Home” which slightly echoed Coldplay.

In general they sound like an upbeat Foo Fighters, with influences of The Strokes and The Killers at times. There was an underlying of pop in the writing also. All these comments are compliments, because mainly they sounded original, in that all their songs were theirs and theirs alone. The gig itself was a friendly experience I am grateful of. I was gutted when they finished. The Automatic fans warmed to them well and they left the stage with no complaints.

Well we all know who The Automatic are. They’re not my cup-of-tea, but they have an obvious loyal fan-base. They walked on stage with egos slightly blazing. This isn’t a bad thing, but they have to back it up with good music. They failed in this.

They reminded me of Good Charlotte when they walked on. This is not a compliment.

I’ll give them some credit, the set was a attempt to show their diversity, i.e: being influenced by punk-ska, Billy Idol and even a keyboard sounding like the recent Owl City’s ‘Fireflies’. However their writing was not up to scratch.

‘Under Control’ was more constructively written, their best song to be fair.

Then they broke into ‘Monster’, with one of the singers wearing a Freddie Kruger-esque mask. The songs repeatedly changed ‘image’, into Slipknot, then Black Sabbath, but all along I knew who they really were.

Then to throw me, they proved they could do ‘mature’, 10th song having a fuller sound with meaningful lyrics. I was slightly pleased at this point, but then they reverted to type. Three songs that sounded like ‘Monster’ and an anthemic number that sounded like Limp Bizkit.

Despite all the image changes in the set, in general they sound like a clean Green Day with lyrics for kids. They sound very punk/nu-metal but they don’t have the energy in the music to back this up.

However, I can’t argue, the kids love them.