Never Shout Never

The Summer EP

Written by: TL on 14/07/2009 13:20:04

I make it through approximately twenty seconds of "Happy" before I am overwhelmed by a sudden urge to barf up my lunch. Why? Because the track opening Never Shout Never's "The Summer EP" reveals it to be pop so sickeningly sweet that unless you can sit through High School Musical without feeling like destroying something, you might as well click away from this review and forget about this band for good.

Okay, so if you're still with me, let me just disclaim that my use of the word "band" was a bit hasty. Never Shout Never is a moniker used by Christofer Drew Ingle to cover his own personal musical project. On top of his guitar/piano/ukelele/programming, Ingle sings in a characteristic high pitched voice, and vocalists may recognize how his songs seem to be mostly based in his upper register, with him seamlessly switching to falsetto but mostly staying away from lower notes. On one hand this is quite impressive, and on the other it is slightly annoying because he simply sounds overly excited all the time.

Ingle's songs are simple and contagious pop songs following the classic format for such, and for the large part of the EP there is a distinct kinship with bands like The Rocket Summer and Relient K in the sweet (borderline nauseatingly so) catchyness. On record highlight "On The Brightside" you could even mistake NSN for a poppier Death Cab For Cutie/City And Colour. However, most of the time, Ingle's project suffers from the simple fact that he simply does not have the class of his contemporaries. This is shown beyond possible doubt in his annoyingly teeny lyricism the kind of which you can only roll your eyes at.

"I like you/Girl you don't got nothing to prove/to me"

or how about:

"WhoaOhOhOhOah/Darling you're with him/WhoaOhOhOhOah/Damn it's such a shame/WhoaOhOhOhOah/It's driving me insane"

Sigh! With teenybopper lyrics like this, there's just no way around the fact that NSN will be a guilty pleasure at best. It's a shame really, because Chris Ingle can in fact write fine songs, for now there's just way too much tacky sauce on them. Take the "WOO-HOO!"'s of "Happy" or the melodramatic cello's of "Hummingbird" if the lyrics weren't enough for you to get the point (and while we're on those, aren't those the same cellos as in "Don't Wanna Miss A Thing" and "I'm With You"?). Anyway, this would be for teens or tweens with teen urges only, so unless you somehow endured HSM without wanting to stab the Evans twins in the heart multiple times, I suggest you go for some of the FTFO first.

6

Download: On The Brightside, Hummingbird, Happy
For The Fans Of: The Rocket Summer, Relient K, PlayRadioPlay!
Listen: myspace.com/nevershoutnever

Release Date 23.06.2009
Loweway Records

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