With influences by The Jam, The Clash and the Smiths, shirts by Fred Perry and haircuts grade one, The Ordinary Boys couldn’t be any more British if they embarked on a Bank Holiday tour of sleepy seaside venues with amps draped in Union Jacks.
In fact, as the DVD accompanying this record shows, they have recently done exactly that.
Brassbound follows last year’s debut album with surprising haste, perhaps too much to tell the truth. The record certainly captures a band full of confidence and life, an energy presumably drawn from the high profile touring that the group have undertaken over the past year.
Their sound is very much rooted in the red, white and blue of the '70s and '80s, a mish-mash of punk, mod and ska but they by no means sound like a bunch of cheap wannabes.
They’ve managed to expand their vision admirably in such a short space of time too, adding extra dimensions by way of brass and, on closing track ‘Red Letter Day’, clever use of strings.
The only problem with Brassbound is that you feel it may have come six months too early in terms of songwriting. All the tracks bounce along with an unavoidable enthusiasm, yet few really stick in your mind after they finish. Enigmatic frontman Preston (and we know he’s enigmatic because he has a one word name) has a fair crack at expanding his world view but this is mostly still rooted in the existence of a young man watching life open up in front of him.
As invigorating a listen as Brassbound undoubtedly is, The Ordinary Boys should go away, see more of the world, and come back in a couple of years with the killer record that they’ve obviously got in them somewhere.