Besties - Singer

by Tommy Gunnarsson

published: 22 / 12 / 2005

Label: Skipping Stones Records
Format: CD

"Happy and melodic indiepop" on first album from up-and-coming New York trio the Besties

Review

British indiepop is dead, as far as I can see. Sure, bands like Belle and Sebastian keep up the good work, but if you want your indiepop the old traditional way you have to go across the pond to the US. Labels like Matinée, Shelflife and Magic Marker continue to release fantastic music all the time (even though some of the bands they put out records by are actually from the UK.) And that’s just three labels that I wrote from the top of my head. There are plenty more, and here’s another one: Skipping Stones Records. So far they only have two bands, the Charade from Sweden (with members from the Shermans and Happydeadmen) and the Besties from Brooklyn, New York. The Besties were formed a couple of years ago by Marisa and Kelly, two childhood friends from Florida who began playing keyboards and singing together. Eventually songs were written and when they were visiting New York they met Rikky who joined them on guitar. As they didn’t know of any drummer, they settled for a drum-machine. ‘Singer’ is the first album by the trio, and it’s really good to hear a band that plays happy and melodic indiepop the way it’s supposed to sound. The label compares them to bands like Talulah Gosh, Tullycraft and All Girl Summer Fun Band, with the last one being the most accurate of the comparisons. Both their melodies and lyrics have a lot in common with those written by Jen Sbragia and her bandmates in Portland, especially the way they sounded on their first self-titled album back in 2001. I really didn’t have any expectations when I got this CD, as I have learned that record label descriptions often are very inaccurate, but this is the best album so far this year. But keep in mind that the year is only a couple of weeks old…