Lato - More Art Than Convenience

  by Chris Jones

published: 15 / 11 / 2002

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More solid than stunning?  Lato deliver a very solid album of what I have to simply call Brit-rock.  I happen to like Brit-rock though, so that's not a bad thing.  This album is full of rock'n'blues sounding guitars, organs, "do-do-do's", and even some horns.  I bet this band can be pretty loud live.  A cover of the Style Council's 'It Just Came to Pieces in My Hands' is probably the stand out track on the album. With its strummy acoustic guitars over a cool organ tone and bouncy beat, it would sound good on the radio.  'Rack Up a Replay' and 'Shiver in the Mirror' deliver a rocking tone a la late era Brit-rock (think Hurricane #1 maybe) with the guitars cranked up nicely.  Lato also prove able to deliver more mellow goods too on tracks like 'Lighthouse' and 'Fireflies', both of which have a sombre retrospective feel that is delivered quite well. Then there's 'Until Tomorrow' which both rocks and sways and is probably the runner up song on the album.  This album didn't really grab me on first listening to it, but it has grown on me since then.  It seems each time I listen to it I hear another line in a song or a guitar riff that I like.  The music is fairly familiar sounding, but done well enough that that doesn't hold it back.  It's easy to bounce along to these songs and each of them hold their own quite well - which seems to be rare on album these days.  Plus, anyone that covers the Style Council and does a good job of it gets some points in my book!

Track Listing:-

1 Rack Up A Replay
2 It Just Came To Pieces In My Hands
3 Shiver In The Mirror
4 Lighthouse
5 Respond
6 Self Confidence
7 Airhead
8 Fireflies
9 Until Tomorrow
10 I Wanna Be Me
11 Picture
12 Lounge International

Label Links:-

http://www.firestation-records.de/
https://www.facebook.com/firestationrecords
https://www.youtube.com/user/FirestationRecords/videos

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