There’s a bit of a misnomer in the title of the second album from Coventry’s The Enemy. Its not so much “Music For The People” than “Music From The People”.
The Enemy are much like Oasis the band they will support this summer. Not in sound but in influence. They don’t so much plagiarise but take influence. And on this album The Enemy have taken their influences and at some points other bands songs wholesale.
This is not to say it’s a bad album, its not its an enjoyable listen from beginning to end. It’s just that it all seems naggingly familiar like Tom Clarke has made an album of his iPod favourites play list. The Enemy were once the victims of scathing put down by the singer of some Shoreditch band or other, (lets face it they’re all alike). The claim being that their NME award laughed in the face of natural selection, yet the songs on this album sound exactly like natural selection.
From the brooding opening bars of “Elephant Song” sounding like Led Zeppelin not just in musical terms but in literary ones, to the closing “silver spoon” stealing the messianic refrain from The Who’s “Tommy” finale. This is big music.. Music for the everyman. Just as Oasis did before them.
The debut’s title track stole heavily from The Jam’s “That’s Entertainment”, but “Music For The People” simply wants to entertain.. There isn’t really a track that is anything less, nothing you would skip. In-between the two 60’ influenced bookends we get a little history of popular culture as interpreted by Tom Clarke, yes he’s still angry at the state of the country but its far more palatable when dressed up as Pulp’s “Common People” or Blur’s “Universal”. The former is a biting little nugget now titled “A Nation Of Checkout Girls”.. the supermarket theme of the Pulp songs video obviously took hold in Clarke’s head and never let go. Blur’s influence can be heard on “Last Goodbye”, a soaring ballad also in the vain of Richard Ashcroft.
For a young man Clarke has an old head on his shoulders. “Keep Losing” another slow paced number laments “its hard when you’re young, too late when you’re old” in a similar vain to an Oasis B-Side “Just Getting Older”, but Noel had 10 years on Clarke when that was written so you have to tip your hat to the younger man he can touch the soul of this reviewer.
“Sing When You’re in Love” is the centrepiece of the whole record, it’s the song Clarke himself put forward as testament to The Enemy’s bigger sound and was road tested live back in 2008. Its an anthemic feel good sing at closing time number, exactly the sort of thing he was aiming for, and he’s nailed it. As he does with the single “No Time For Tears” resplendent with choral backing vocals echoing Pink Floyd’s “Great Gig In The Sky”
Its not all good, “51st State” is a clichéd pun that the UK is just another part of America, something New Model Army noted when Clarke was still in nappies. Even worse is that the songs trite lyrics are attached to a 2nd hand Jam riff, which is exactly what the detractors had them for in the first place. “Don’t Break The Red Tape” is a lumpen mid paced number best left to the likes of Snow Patrol, as a political statement its more pink panther than black panther.
In short though this is a good record, a record you’ve heard before in other peoples collections but it’s a big record and it shows the band have progressed, and that’s good enough for Clarke and its good enough for me.
Scruff’s Rating: 7/10
Here are the sales figures for The Enemy's 'Music For The People', the Coventry trio missed the number one spot by just 6,976 copies. We'll Live And Die In These Towns sold 39,191 copies on it's first release, but recent album charts have been down 16%. The new album has sold 3,828 fewer copies than it's predecessor, yet if Music For The People had been released a week earlier - it would have been number one as Lady GaGa's The Fame sold 33,828 copies last week.
