The Sound Explosion
Apollo

**Fuzz. Bass twerp. Shout-a-lout. Cymbal crash. Shout-a-lout. Bass twerp. Fuzz.

**

So there you have it, ditch the A-side. It’s not going to excite you a great deal, and in a genre so swamped by mediocrity it is frankly unnecessary. What is necessary is the visceral, acrobatic B-side which sounds like boomsticks and close thunder. Which, though the blitz is long dead, can still run rampage through bonfire night and drop to its knees, panting for breath in an alleyway while the town at least sounds like it’s exploding around it.

Where ‘Apollo’ flails ‘Let It Turn Inside Itself’ reaches upwards; a Who with their strides dirtied by the city’s smog and its cruddy gutter-puddles, or a more workmanlike Heroes of Switzerland. For a band who sell themselves as rawky, rootsy R’n’B these here are commendably British vocals, though they do at times sound suspiciously like Chris Moyles getting all agit. Which, to be fair, is really alright when the fat DJ hurriedly squeezes 5-liners like "I am a guilt, I am a liar/ This is my heaven, my soul is on fire/ It’s sneaking up like a telephone wire/ Which is ironic because you said/ That I cannot communicate" into melodies that are tighter than tight.

It’s fair to say The Sound Explosion have no higher purpose. This is rock’n’roll for its own sake, ducking and weaving free from the constraints of pre-conceived artistic intent and the safety ropes of credibility. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t – and, when taken as an entity, ‘Apollo’ is typically two-faced.