Indie music and all its offspring – Britpop, Emo, Indie Rock, etc – all seem to be interested in making big, bombastic, boisterous music, which is fine, considering the sound made by some of its early pioneers, Sonic Youth, The Jesus and Mary Chain, The Smiths and the like. But indie was always about going against the flow and the fashion, and, in a way, that is precisely what we find Santa Claws doing with their latest single, “Rainy Day.”
If most indie music is about building energetic anthems, here, it is the subtle understatement that defines the sound. While many such bands aim to be incendiary and energetic, Santa Claws shows that restraint and space are equally powerful tools and in that way they build a bridge between the indie realm and more dream-pop pastures.
The breathing space that they allow themself enables the song’s qualities to shine through: the jangling and resonant guitars, the gorgeous harmonies that drift in all directions, and the poetic and reflective lyrics, chiming piano, deftness and delicacy.
This French trio echoes the sound of Brit-pop, but it is a version of that sound that is more seductive, more intricatly woven, engaging, and appealing, to me at least. And I can’t help thinking what Brit-pop might have sounded like if it had formed not in the back rooms of Camden pubs but in the cool hangouts of Toulouse’s music sector. Well, it wouldn’t have been called Britpop for a start, but it might have been all the better for such a birth place.
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