Vundabar, a band that makes shit-hot indie rock band music

[alan nagsworth]

Maybe I mentioned them here before but I think they deserve a thread because they're just really really good. I stumbled on their album "Smell Smoke" when it came out in 2018 and have been absolutely obsessed with it since. Pretty much all the songs off it will pop into my head on totally random occasions and I just have to listen to it again to scratch the itch. Only today did I finally venture further afield to their prior album "Gawk" and fuck me if it's not the same fare: BANGERS LEFT RIGHT AND CENTRE. More people should know about this stuff!

In the indie thread I started last year I cited stuff like The Cribs and Tapes n' Tapes among some of the best stuff from the mid-'00s and there's tons of that vibe here, such an excellent knack for songwriting. It's pretty similar to that droll '90s stuff like Pavement, as well as packing some tight post-punk melodic grooves. They have a bunch of ideas but they hold their own sound really well.

Acetone

Cotton Kid

Tonight I'm Wearing Silk

Diver

[alan nagsworth]

Come on you turds

[alan nagsworth]

Last chance to listen to some new music before I potentially give up trying to start new threads on here if anyone wants to have a try? Or we could just continue talking about old music forever and ever. I don%u2019t give a fuck any more tbh

[sevendaughters]

Nags, I had a listen but it didn't quite hit me. You know the expression "nothing dates like the recent past"? It sort of reminded me of that, like they've gone to the sounds of the mid-00s too quickly for me to be ready for a new version of it even though it might even be fundamentally good (like, they didn't seem like bad songwriters or anything).

[chveik]

it's not very good. there's nothing really new about them.

[the]

I found Acetone appealing, the others decreasingly so but weren't bad, it sounds like pretty solid stuff as the indie-rock thing goes. And I'm less interested in guitar stuff than most people here so I'm quite surprised that it didn't seem to land with anyone

[Inspector Norse]

(like, they didn't seem like bad songwriters or anything).

I thought they seemed like bad songwriters to be honest. Facile melodies, structures just aping better, older (yes) stuff. Takes an awful lot for indie bands to impress these days; bands like these just give the impression of lacking a frame of reference or influence outside their own peers. You can draw too straight a line from The Fall and Pavement to this.

[shh]

All I'm hearing is my chemical romance.

[Chriddof]

And I'm less interested in guitar stuff than most people here so I'm quite surprised that it didn't seem to land with anyone

I suspect that for people who were teenagers during the 80s or 90s and were well into the guitar based rock of those decades (like me), this is actually less interesting than if you're not as familiar with all of it. Took a look at the first video and it didn't seem like anything new, and as it's already been stated it's very mid-2000s, which is already my least favourite time for indie stuff to begin with.

[Gamma Ray]

Listening to these jokers now and I have to say I quite like what I'm hearing. Fuck these other guys and their jaded musical palette. Or maybe I'm just having a moment as normally I'd say that indie rock is wet and FUCKING SUCKS but then I'd also say that you're a FUCKING MORON if you write off entire musical genres or even bother with them at all. Guess I'm just a DICK.

[alan nagsworth]

You can draw too straight a line from The Fall and Pavement to this.

That doesn't stop Pavement from being a great band though so I don't really see why it would be any different for Vundabar. I'm well aware of how derivative they are but that doesn't mean I don't still find the tunes catchy as hell and great fun to listen to. I really like this band a lot and I think Smell Smoke is a cracking little album.

Sorry for being a gobshite upthread but I hope people see where I'm coming from. I'd much prefer if people talked about what they don't like instead of just ignoring a thread because they don't share the OP's enthusiasm. Especially someone as dumbly enthusiastic about stuff as I am.

[Dewt]

alan I don't know if you noticed but the extra characters "-hot" seem to have got into your thread title

[bgmnts]

Yeah indie cack was never my thing 15 years ago and it's evidently not now.

You do you though alan!

[bgmnts]

Sorry for being a gobshite upthread but I hope people see where I'm coming from. I'd much prefer if people talked about what they don't like instead of just ignoring a thread because they don't share the OP's enthusiasm. Especially someone as dumbly enthusiastic about stuff as I am.

You ignore all my threads dick.

[Clownbaby]

Not feeling these lads I'm afraid. Actually completely indifferent to them. The melodies are very familiar sounding but not in a good way I don't think. I do like to check out your recommendations though nags, when I'm actually here.

On the subject of threads being ignored, I find Oscillations is the oddest part of this site cause (maybe this is just me) I find it pure hard to judge when to enter any music conversation without it ending abruptly. Also the whole thing where if someone mentions a band they're getting into in a new conversation they might get told ''there was already a thread about that band a few months ago'' but you just know if you bump that older thread to talk about the band, nothing. I don't really bother starting threads about new artists I'm liking cause I'm usually lucky if i get 2 responses to be honest. Then again I'm hardly on here anymore so I'm basically just adding to the amount of people who don't engage with someone's lil excited thread about the band they've discovered.

[Dewt]

Bear in mind that the only person wrong in any of those situations is the person who thinks it's a problem that there was already a thread, etc.

[Clownbaby]

I get that it's usually about keeping threads tidy and not repeating things but it still feels a bit pedantic when someone immediately replies with ''already a thread on them'' cause it kind of stops the poster in their tracks. I guess it's fair enough if the band thread was very recent and is till on the front page but otherwise, it's a bit annoying that a conversation wasn't allowed to naturally carry on, including some band that has been mentioned before. Bringing up a band casually might make more fans pop up with stomething else to say about them

[Cuellar]

Not into these guys but you've turned me on to some good shit in the past alan so keep at it

[Dewt]

I get that it's usually about keeping threads tidy and not repeating things but it still feels a bit pedantic when someone immediately replies with ''already a thread on them'' cause it kind of stops the poster in their tracks.

Sometimes they're just saying that to let you know that you might enjoy the content in that other thread. You should absolutely continue with your current thread.

[Clownbaby]

Sometimes they're just saying that to let you know that you might enjoy the content in that other thread. You should absolutely continue with your current thread.

I should make it clear that I don't necessarily think everyone who mentions another thread is trying to be a twat, tonally it's usually easy to tell who is annoyed that you haven't used their thread to mention the band they said they liked before you and who just wants to let you know that there's interest in the  and already and you should join in with that.

Also back on topic - the lead singer very much reminds me of someone else and I can't place who it is

[bgmnts]

Think you should create a thread about this.

[Gamma Ray]

So who are these fucks copying then? I mean I don't hear Pavement (though everything after their first couple of albums is mostly FUCKING TERRIBLE anyway) or The Fall (though the only tracks by them that I've heard that weren't total dogshit are Hit The North and the live version of Life Just Bounces, which admittedly rocks harder than a crack dealer). Also like the rt hon OP later says, what does it matter if it's derivative anyway, so long as it makes you FEEL? Fair fucks if it doesn't, maybe you've just got nerve damage or your ears are broken or something.

The tracks I listened to weren't the ones posted by the rt hon. OP admittedly so perhaps they are balls.

[Gamma Ray]

Yeah I quoted myself but it just looked (even) dumb(er).

[Dewt]

I should make it clear that I don't necessarily think everyone who mentions another thread is trying to be a twat, tonally it's usually easy to tell who is annoyed that you haven't used their thread to mention the band they said they liked before you and who just wants to let you know that there's interest in the  and already and you should join in with that.

Fuck 'em though, they're wrong, just start threads and if they complain tell them to get a disease.

This doesn't apply to alan though, who is objectively wrong for starting an original thread about a band that is not to most people's tastes.

[Clownbaby]

Fuck 'em though, they're wrong, just start threads and if they complain tell them to get a disease.

This doesn't apply to alan though, who is objectively wrong for starting an original thread about a band that is not to most people's tastes.

Aye that alan tsk tsk how dare he

The nerve

[C_Larence]

Didn't like them, but appreciate the recommendation and it's inspired me to start a thread I've been meaning to for a while.

[Pearly-Dewdrops Drops]

I liked it. Reminds me a bit of mid-00s Mystery Jets (who I am shocked to learn have been making music continuously ever since).

[alan nagsworth]

This is proving to be the spiciest thread this sub forum has EVER seen

[greenman]

Someone travel back in time and make sure Pavement never form, hopefully early Mercury Rev then becomes the template for US indie instead.

[Sin Agog]

Sounds more like Feeder than Pavement to me.  If you wanna see someone rip off Pavement, this Chinese band I once saw, Carsick Cars, do it a lot: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NRKznQXtBn4 I'm sure that's the exact same hook from one of their songs.  Don't know Pavement well enough to tell which one, though.