Anything that has something to do with the New Zealand masters The Clean will always get my attention. So when the name of Clean’s drummer Hamish Kilgour was mentioned in connection with this self-titled debut album by the Brooklyn band Roya, I certainly had to take a listen. And then a few more. Even more, will certainly ensue.
On the surface, you get breezy, clear and fun pop driven by the vocals (and backing vocals of other members) of Rahill Jamalifard of Habibi. It is a bit reminiscent of all the good stuff coming out of New Zealand since The Clean, The Chills and The Bats cropped up on the scene and along with Hamish and Rahill, Jay Heiselmann from the Grooms and co-composer of most of the tunes, Alix Brown who previously played with Jay Reatard among others and the two other members of the band make the sound actually their own.
But what dominates the proceedings stuck between light and sweet pop wafers are Rahill’s very engaged lyrics. Scum Rise asks a question when does it come to a point when you had enough and can’t saturate any more bad events and End Times tries to see the irony and seriousness of all the televised bad events continuously being interspersed with commercials. To keep the serious tone combined with sweet pop sounds, we also get Dr. Death which takes another look at now almost forgotten Dr. Kavorkian and what he stood for, without really taking sides.
In essence, it is an album of two completely different concepts - a sweet musical one, and a bitter, serious lyrical one. But instead of combining like oil and water, or better to say not combining at all. Roya makes sure that they match perfectly. I guess they have managed to come up with a great musical way to swallow a bitter pill. A great achievement in itself, let alone good music and great lyrics.
