Though their origins as a vehicle for songsmith Matt Joe Gow drew inspiration from America’s mid-west, and blue collar heroes Petty and Springsteen; The Dead Leaves debut as a fully-fledged unit is more aligned to America’s East Coast, more specifically the polished sounds of Brooklyn, NY.
Gloom merchants Interpol inform the stabbing guitars of ‘In My Surrender’ and the dark, angular ‘Cover’.
While there’s echoes of those heroes of austere honesty, The National, in the triumphant mix of rousing brass and emotionally cathartic chorus of ‘If The Shoe Fits.’ Gow’s rich baritone eerily occupying the same injured zone as Matt Berninger’s everyman poetry.
There’s more to the Dead Leaves than stock references however.
Each moody cut demonstrates a near-ruthless ambition to strike a universal appeal through stylish sincerity, but also a group capable of well-arranged, well-executed songs that synthesises their influences rather than being hamstrung by them.
