Famous - Party Album

Sometimes it’s hard to find your voice within a scene of bands rising at the same time. It may be something you could attribute to Famous, first popping into frame in a world of new bands from the often-anointed ‘Windmill Scene’ of bands, but on ‘Party Album’ they find their voice and then some. A screaming cry of love, affection, and hope in an all-too-bleak modern world - it’s a debut album that isn’t afraid to step into the darkness and find the beauty within.

The spinning electro-refrains of ‘What Are You Doing For The Rest Of Your Life’ and the roaring ‘2004’ are but two markers of a record that never stays in the same place for more than a couple of minutes. Sounding more like a classic emo record designed to be screamed back for years to come, the crashing noise-rock of ‘God Hold You’ hits like a bulldozer, whilst on ‘Warm Springs’ things almost become so intense that it borders on the uncomfortable. Yet that is exactly where ‘Party Album’ thrives.

Subverting any form of the expected results in one of the most forward-thinking albums of the year, it’s a defining diary that zooms in so much on the personal by wrapping you in a dense wall of sound that at times you may want to look away. Its stunning nature shines through on the grandstand ‘The Destroyer’, which taps into the DNA of a stadium-sized epic, but the closing one-two of ‘Leaving Tottenham’ and ‘Love Will Find A Way’ lay its heart out clear to see. The former is a rising, choir-like singalong that swells and swells into pure release; the latter a closing-time ode spotlighting the heart of what really matters. It perfectly captures an album that might just be the unexpected gem that many have been waiting for.

‘Party Album’ isn’t the album that springs to mind when you think of a party, but in its unflinching honesty, it stands as the soundtrack to what magic can be found in the darkest corner of one.