steering clear of the mainstream
since 2001

june 2010

review
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info opinion

Spoonfork

"All is Well" CD

Gourmé

Genre: rock, indie rock, garage rock revival

July 3 2008

Taking a cue from the wily rock acrobatics of The Arctic Monkeys, Swedish duo Spoonfork play exciting and bounding guitar music with decent pop appeal. The compositions are frequently loaded with starts and stops and louds and softs, with the all-important vocals meeting halfway between the confident blare of Alex Turner and the unflappable cool of Julian Casablancas. It's good fun, but as was true of the Arctic Monkeys' efforts, over ten songs (all but two of which pass the four minute mark) the rock fervour can become a tad much.

Another knock on this duo is that, oftentimes, their songs don't seem to go anywhere or tie together properly. Although exceptions like fiery "From the F" and parts of "Bustin' Heads for Dr. Death" manage to stitch themselves into cohesive songs, other tracks don't fare so well. "Continuum" starts promisingly but becomes too disjointed, and confusing "The Undertaker" has no reason to be over nine minutes long.

All this energy is not entirely misplaced, however. I could see Spoonfork being a really fun live act, and moments on All Is Well show where the promise lies - still, however, some time in the slow-cooker is definitely needed.

spoonfork's myspace

65%

Matt Shimmer

[Vitals: 10 tracks, 53:53, distributed by the label, released 2008]