Album Review: Suckers - Wild Smile
- Written by Lucy Dearlove
From glam rock-esque squawks to stoned whispers, steel guitars and horn sections, Suckers's debut album Wild Smile is characterised by easy-going psychadelia. It's a funny one, though, On my first listen, I found it initially a slightly incoherent record, and I was pleased to persevere and be proved wrong; it's worth investing the time because, given half a chance, the first LP from this Brooklyn based (quelle surprise!) quartet will burrow itself firmly under your skin and stay there.
Opener ‘Save Your Love For Me’ gives little away. It's a slow burner, layers of repetitive synthy keyboard and acoustic guitar hooks and murmured vocal harmonies crawling along dreamily until around three minutes in, where Quinn Walker unleashes the full power of his falsetto howl and the horn section pipes up, leaving you thinking 'Where the hell did that come from?' And that's where things start to get interesting. The following track, ‘Black Sheep’, throws a disco beat into the ring, and stands back to watch it slug it out with some Fender power chords and more
The vocals are the real star here. While falsetto isn't exactly breaking news in the history of the guitar band, having a male vocalist with these impressive upper octaves lurking behind that Williamsburg stubble is like possessing a notoriously difficult to operate weapon that could quite easily backfire. Comparisons are bound to be drawn with Wild Beasts and their elastic-voiced front man Hayden Thorpe, who have had the howling market cornered of late. Both live and on record, Thorpe's vocals are given a starring role. Suckers, on the other hand, make beautifully crafted psych-pop songs, that are enriched by Walker's voice rather than defined by them. On ‘A Mind I Knew’ and ‘Roman Candles’, he sings backing vocals, allowing his bandmate's baritones to take a leading role, lending the album a depth that would be perhaps absent without the complexity of these harmonies.
These multiple part harmonies make for a joyous listen, even straying occasionally into a gospel and spiritual sound, particularly on ‘You Can Keep Me Running Around’, where the chorus soars out of an unassuming organ and guitar driven backing and falls back into a fascinating call and answer vocal part, with the deceptively simple guitar melody still circulating ad infinitum in the background. This is an impressive debut long player from a band who have previously only released a single EP. It continues to delight and surprise after countless listens and we should hope for even greater things from Suckers in the future.