Fanfarlo - comets, 2009

"This London-based five-piece are fronted by Swedish singer Simon Balthazar, whose presence dominates this rather samey and overwrought debut. With a mannered, slurred singing voice pitched somewhere between David Byrne and Brendan Flowers of The Killers, he is both what makes Fanfarlo most distinctive and also the thing that is most likely to wind you up. Because of the way he sings, the lyrics seem incidental, if not entirely instrumental."