Boybands have a lot to answer for. They have inflicted suspect music upon innocent consumers, forced us to learn complex dance moves for weddings and finally made the previously gay-males-only territory of groomed eyebrows, tight jeans and sleeveless shirts mandatory for the straight man (ok - so it's not a total disaster).
But, at least their music stayed on one side - the pop side to be exact. Boybands knew where they stood in the grand scheme of music, and bands like Travis and the Manics knew where they stood, and never, ever shall the twain meet - else we'd all be ice-skating home because hell would surely have frozen over. Well, get your ice-skates on kids because, with 'Make it Good', former boyband a1 are aiming to re-invent themselves as... gasp... a credible rock band.
Pop music can be broadly categorized in three ways: very good, relentlessly mediocre and scary. As a pop band - a1 fell somewhere between very good and the mediocre but as a rock band - they fall somewhere between a rock and a pop place that looks a little like nowhere. 'Make it Good' has all the best tracks right up front in the hopes that the listener will either get bored by track 7 or have reached wherever they were going and have turned the thing off. Let's just say it takes more than a session drummer and singing on stools to turn yourselves into a proper 'band'. Even producer Mike Hedges - who produces the aforementioned Travis and Manics - can't help these guys (let's hope he got a big check in return for his musical soul).
It seems that a1 have set their sights firmly on chart success in America and this album should be just the ticket: choc-a-block with sweeping, sappy ballads about beautiful but unhinged girls and the regretful boys who love them. You will all be familiar with first single 'Caught in the Middle' and current single 'Make It Good' (tracks 1 and 2 - no surprise there) both of which are so infectiously catchy that you may consider giving yourself a pre-frontal lobotomy with a ball-point pen just to get them out of your head.
Third track 'Here Comes the Rain' will undoubtedly be the next single with it's voluminous strings section and stirring chorus. You can already picture the video - some winsome girl looking sad while the guys emote their little hearts out through a rainstorm. 'This Ain't What Love is About's first line is a thinly disguised Van Morrison lyric and probably the most 'rocking' tune of the lot - it could easily pass for a song by The Calling or Savage Garden.
However, the US eats this hybrid of manufactured pseudo rock-pop-shit up with gigantic spoons. In fact the raison d'etre of MTV's afternoon delight Total Request Live is to showcase this bland music for girls to squeal about, and moms to name-drop proving they are 'in the know'.
a1 - the Total Request studios await. Godspeed you burgeoning soft rock superstars.
