The Pleasure Leftists : " The Woods of Heaven"

Hailing from Canada The Pleasure Leftists have really come into their own. While the vocals have hints of Siouxsie , they go about this the right way that the rest of frantic music racing around the vocals take the attention away from that fact rather than forcing the vocals to carry the songs. This has a very punk energy to it , yet a surf rock tone to the guitar. The drums could have stood to have been given more love in the mix as the album doesn't have much bass in the mix. One under lying lying influence I can here than contributes to their attack is the Police and not the radio Police , but earlier on when they were more punk than poppy new wave prog with a reggae fetish. The toms that lead into " A New Name" seem to set the tone for a darker change of pace. This does accentuate the Siouxsie to the vocals, but it doesn't turn me off to this. The vocals are more thoughtful in creating hooks. The guitar seems almost secondary.

They speed back up on "Protection" and the vocals don't seem to find their purpose until the guitar riff breaks down into a more pal muted b section to the verse. Most of the songs are under three minutes , but don't feel rushed despite the brisk tempos most seem to be. "Private Persons" they maintain the albums energy, but it is not as finely tuned as the rest of the album and is the first song that comes across as filler to me. "Marathon' is even faster a song, but the vocals fall into all the right cracks on it just works.It sounds like they are going to take another darker turn on "Burning Down" which is different in the fact that they break away from the more punk paced thing they do into some more disjointed to the point of where it doesn't gel on purpose until the click of a drum machine shows up over half way end, making it an ill advised experimentation that sound more like an intro than a song. They close out the album with the more passionate punk infused "Reality Changes" where she sings that they don't know how real it feels. Overall this is a good take on something we have heard before and sets the band up to take the place of Arctic Flowers , who went too punk with their last one. it's high energy , but employs tones that keep them from just being a punk band . i'll give it an 8.5.

6.4