"Nothing is completely original...I’m not sure things have been original for awhile. I envision a clone to be a less perfect version of its former self.”
Technically a clone is a perfect version of its former self, but my semantic accuracy aside I agree with Ben Payes (guitar, synth, vocals) of Clones of Clones. So I like the name, one of the few honest band names (more honest would have been Clones of Clones of Clones of Clones of Clones of Clones of Clones of Clones of ...) in that of course music is cloned! (Cloned in Payes' rough sense)
You wouldn't understand music that was completely original. It would be like the people in two dimension-land trying to understand a three dimensional object dropped in their midst...
So is Clones of Clones' specific mix of cloned material worth your time? I can't definitively answer that for you, but I will start by saying I bought the album.
It was only nine dollars.
It was a good deal.
All the songs are good - they're all working together to make an album, and although there might be a few 'singles' here and there it is definitely one piece of work. I like a band that can do that.
But the important part, the band's sound, is interesting... they remind me of a Brisbane based band Ball Park Music, who blend a lot of styles and might have this-style verse leading to that-style chorus and they make it sweet. Monster heart continues their decided lo-fi sound (not actually lo-fi, they have mixed it to pretend to be lo-fi... hmm...) but this mainly pertains to the rhythm section, they have all these tight melodic synth lines and moody atmospheric stuff going on between the rock stuff. So it's original, they're sitting between a few genres really.
They tell us on Facebook that their influences are Minus The Bear, The Shins, Manchester Orchestra and Modest Mouse, and obviously this is who the writing forces are listening to, but from this album I derived the equation David Bowie + (Nirvana - Kurt Cobain) + (Mumford and Sons -1000banjos) + Indie pop music of the past six months. I encourage you to refute this equation.
Monster Heart sets you up in the first two tracks, signature sounding 'I Don't Need Your Love' is chilled with a big chorus, title track Monster Heart is a grungy rock song. (Good work)
I have to say they started off with my three favourite tracks... by the end, although I was aurally satisfied I think I wanted a favourite song to end on. Maybe that is my personal album-structuring preference.
I strongly encourage everyone to go to iTunes and purchase the first track of the album and if you vaguely connect with it, risk the other eight bucks and buy it. They may be clones of clones but there is definitely something strong here; a different take on pop and rock of the last five years definitely
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/monster-heart/id1016604367
http://www.clonesofclones.com/
https://www.facebook.com/clonesofclones
https://soundcloud.com/clonesofclones
