“This music is designed to have you oscillating wildly.” And so Oxon-Bucks three-piece Peerless Pirates give their game away. Which is at least something, since their Myspace offers precious little by way of information other than a few annoying hints that they might be real pirates.
But of course they’re not. They’re Smiths fans, albeit pretty chipper Smiths fans, which I guess is something different. They can summon up a lively jangle-pop canter, that’s undeniable, but those not-so subtle reference points are unavoidable, from the singer’s bold, poetic delivery, sense of doomed romance (especially on `Where Is Michael’) and occasionally arcane language (although “Unhand me, you swine” could just as easily be Russell Brand, himself a shameless Morrissey devotee), through the guitarist’s intricate jangle, right down to the harmonica on `Random Shags or Regular Kisses’, which is ripped wholesale from `This Charming Man’. Elsewhere `Those Fashion Stakes’ pillages `Still Ill’, while, in a slight shift in style, `Bring Out Your Dead’ adopts a sprightly rockabilly stance, something a certain Stephen Patrick has been known to enjoy on occasion.
Not that Peerless Pirates are hopeless copyists, and their scrappy, jangly take on classic indie fizz and froth is more than passable, with a welcome feeling of melodrama. Their tales of `High Sea Love Affair’ aren’t as swashbuckling as they’d probably like to think they are, but against a backdrop of contemporary English guitar pop’s parochial dying embers, they offer a reminder of more bountiful times.