The Stills
Logic Will Break Your Heart

Tired of hearing about the new indie revolution yet? Not sure who’s leading what charge and who’s got the flag? Or is it all in the critic’s heads? Be wary, very wary of whom you trust when it comes to matters of music.

Of course, that’s all bunk really, it comes down to bands and records; judged only by themselves on their own merits. However, it’d be nice if there was another golden age of reverb and introspection, if only to remove the jagged shards of distressed denim from our wounded hearts.

Cycles, it’s all cycles, and that indeed is ‘Logic Will Break Your Heart’ in a perpetual motion nutshell. Heartbreak, darkness, disgust, redemption, heartbreak darkness, disgust, short-lived redemption. Repeat. Repeat.

It’s not a pretty record; while of course, being at times a very pretty record. Grandiose and majestic are probably the oft repeated words, and that doesn’t surprise, with influences anchored by the sounds of Echo & The Bunnymen, Joy Division and all manner of twenty-year old bands that I won’t condescend you by mentioning. I haven’t heard of them either. Embedded in a self-regarding mausoleum of reverb, ‘Logic…’ coldly croons of a world that’s left the warm-hearted behind, of a life beset by misery, much of it caused by affairs of the heart. Ah, the girls. What hope for a band who intently inform you how “the girl will screw you”, with all that’s left being “suicide dreams” (all set nicely to hefty sounds and metronomic peals of guitar in ‘The Gender Bomb’). Of course, misanthropy is the common bedfellow of misogyny. The otherwise fantastically uplifting ‘Changes Are No Good’ informs us that “I am a weekday on weekends/I hate my best friends”, whilst the excellent ‘Love and Death’ steams along on a New Order bassline, synced with the not-so-cheery observation “don't bother counting on me / loving me / just stand back I'm gone”.

But it’s not all self-hatred and internal barbed wire. There’s a song on there about candyfloss and walks in the park. No, of course there isn’t. And why should there be? The Stills are a sad band. Which 9 times out of 10 makes them better than happy bands. Warped logic? Have you seen the world out there? You’re reading an online review of a band that has sold not too many more than dick-all records to the population at large. I’m kind of assuming that you’re not a Cheeky Girls fan. You know the score. We need sad-bastard indie records like we need big overcoats in the eternal winters of our soul. Even better when they’re very good sad-bastard indie records.

And ‘Logic..’ most definitely is that. It may not be the best, but then again, it’s treading plastic spheres in the ball-pool of bands like the aforementioned Bunnymen and Joy Division, plus of course The Smiths *and Radiohead. Not falling on its backside is achievement enough. Songs like the jittery Blondie-disco of ‘_Still In Love Song_’, all delusional defiance, storm the cider-stained dance floors of our bedrooms magnificently, while ‘_Lets Roll_’ reaches for the sky, belying the fact that singer *Tim Fletcher is suffering from some sort of slo-mo chest implosion.

Pain and self-disregard, being surrounded in your bedroom by 47 Snickers wrappers and full of self loathing as your elbows drip with blood is a fine thing. These are strong emotions. That’s why we have records made about them. That’s why you buy them. Another heartbreak to add to the shopping list.