Baby Is An Alien –  Aliens (reviewed by Dave Franklin)

It does seem of late, that after a long time spent wondering why music isn’t using its natural platform effectively enough, I have been writing more and more about music with a social conscience. The Judex rallying against wilful ignorance of the world outside their door, The Radioactive Isotopes and their satirical take on North Korea and even songs as direct in their titles as Flag Burner and Not My President all pulling no punches. And now in front of me is the latest from Aliens, a music, art and animation collective whose scope grew quickly from just a songwriting project in the face of the tumultuous state of world affairs.

Baby Is An Alien is a swirl of rock guitars and pop hooks, but where others would be content to groove, this crunches, where they bop this punches, it is hazy and psychedelic, lyrically analogous and elegantly put together. Yes there is a slightly claustrophobic feel from the mass of sounds that they have packed in here, but it is so well threaded together that it never feels overplayed rather energetic, edgy and eclectic.

Driven by Del Amitri stalwart Iain Harvie and film-maker Tim May they have collected a number of interesting people into their multi-discipline, creative circle so that their ideas are not limited to just the usual musical platform and live they are joined by Fraser McColl and Shriekback’s Martyn Barker.

Poignant music is normally born of turbulent times and I have been waiting for bands such as Aliens to make themselves heard and it says something about the tipping point we are reaching that in the last few months I seem to be writing about a raft of discontented, worried, angry voices. All we need to do now is support them so that those voices get heard.