This titular, third, and final single from the EP Headwind does what all great singles do: blend the familiar with the fresh. So much so that, although this is the sound of modern indie music in all its glory, it has me reaching far and wide of sonic reference points. And, oddly enough, the best I can come up with lies outside the realms of indie altogether – imagine if R.E.M. had been a Britpop band!
Too much? Let me explain. Sure, “Headwind” has all the anthemic grandeur that seemed to abound in that Britpop scene, but there is something about the delivery, the gentle rise and fall of the dynamic, that reminds me of the latter period of Athens, Georgia’s finest. No? Just me, then! How about The Lilac Time does Americana? Midlake goes dream pop? Oh, I give up. This isn’t as easy as it looks!
Somehow, CMON CMON is able to write songs that feel both big and gently anthemic (if there is such a thing) and yet cinematic and ambient. I know those descriptions seem contradictory, unresolvable…opposites, but you know what they say about the power of opposites to attract.
And, it is the band’s ability to juggle such disparate and different sonic elements and piece them all together into something that shouldn’t really work but does, and does so brilliantly, that makes them such a brilliant experience.
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