A few years ago Brian Eno bemoaned the absence of even the slightest hint of an exploratory spirit in much of modern popular music. The mood of the times, he pointed out sadly, seemed to privilege curatorship over innovation. Forward momentum was proving a less magnetic force than the urge to keep looking backwards.
Unfortunately, the debut album from The Izzys suggests that matters have hardly improved in the intervening period. In fact, the absolute refusal of the New York trio to countenance the existence of any kind of music outside that offered by an incredibly limited and retro palate (basically, Let It Bleed and Beggar’s Banquet) would only confirm the worst suspicions of those out there who see similarities in the attitude of the supposed New Wave of U.S Garage bands, with the reluctance of forest-hiding Japanese soldiers in the fifties to accept that World War Two had come to an end.
The band’s self-titled debut album is a dreary, dispiritingly myopic experience.
It is quite obviously an attempt to distil the essence of the Jimmy Miller Stones – with lots of chugging chords, spiky riffs and bluesy jams – but without any sense whatsoever of degenerate danger or yard-dog wit. Need I tell you how gruelling the result is?
Listening to the unlovely likes of ‘Little Sally Water’ or ‘Highway Blues’ brings on that strange Alzheimer’s haze all too familiar to fans of Jet and TBRMC: I know you, don’t I?
The Izzys are so lacking in presence that in order to forge a connection, you’d be better off conducting a séance than listening to their LP.