You could spend all day trying to pin down exactly where Mercy Kelly’s sound sits in the music-sphere. Is it power-pop with a knowing smirk? Indie-pop dressed up for a night out? Alt-pop with something to prove? Or is it just good, honest indie—a sound that their Manchester home has practically been ground zero for in the modern age? But, to be honest, really, who cares? Labels and tags, genres and pigeon-holes are so last century. What matters is this: “Speak Too Soon” is one of the most effortlessly addictive tunes you’ve stumbled across in ages. Trust me, I know what I’m talking about. I do this for a living.
Understatement is the card they play so decisively here. Even as the spiralling threads of intricate jangle and coiled sonic ornamentation shift a gear and head into the song proper, as backbeats and bass begin to propel it to greater heights, the space and subtlety, the smart dynamics and deft songwriting that is the song’s DNA can’t help but go unnoticed.
This is not a song that makes its mark through anything as pedestrial as volume or velocity, sonic sucker-punch moves or cliched grooves, it is a song that dazzles you because of the light that pours through that carefully constructed space, space in which atmospheres pool and percolate making the song more than the sum of its already intricate and delicate parts.
“Speak Too Soon” shows us that here we have a band that knows how to mine the musical landscape for just the correct elements and influences to infuse their music with. They strike just the right balance of rock groove without succumbing to its bombast and bravado. They err on the subtle side of indie, weaving a chilled yet complex take on its sonics through the song but never getting caught up in its cooler-than-thou attitudes. And they incorporate pop’s addictiveness but never find themselves being seduced by its lowest common denominator glitz.
If there is a sonic fountain of youth, a musical El Dorado, an “x marks the spot” location to be found on the musical map, they have definitely found it.
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