The Ugly Army

This is my first review on Jamendo, even though I feel somewhat hypocritical reviewing music considering my own musical talent. But it felt right that, after downloading dozens of albums, one of the first I've listened to is still my favourite and is the subject of my first review.

FBS has shown, through the release of five albums at the time of writing, to be incredibly versatile. All five differ significantly, and all offer enough to keep you interested. Which one you prefer can be a matter of taste - I find "Make This End" a little too hard-edged for my liking, while "Orgamilk" is a little too light. Nevertheless, both are worthy albums. However, the 'sweet spot' for me is this album.

The opening track is a killer. Upbeat, it grabs you immediately with its electric-piano rhythms. 'Artificial Sun' remains my favourite Jamendo track, simply because I can't get it out of my head. It follows on nicely to the simlarly catchy
'Ugly Army', with great chorus lyrics. The imagery the lyrics call up is a strong point of FBS's music, and no more so than this album.

From here, a slightly darker twist with 'The Hunt', less likeable at first but with further listens becomes compelling. Things get lighter on for a while here. 'Never End Up Like This','Mary' and 'Anything But You' are enjoyable tunes but without the drive or complexity of earlier tracks. The dark horse of the album, for me, though, is the final track, "One More Reason". The use of electric piano is reprised, returning the depth to the album that had drifted a little in tracks 4, 5 and 6. A great way to finish.

I had lost interest in exploring my musical tastes for quite some time, but Jamendo has reignited my interest in digging around for surprising insights into stuff I like. This album was the start of this exploration for me. If you're new to Jamendo, download this album to start off with for a glimpse of the talent there is around. How FBS is not world-famous is beyond me. With albums like this, I'm one of those pushing their music into the ears of anyone who'll listen.

I do not care for this style of music.

But too short. Quality over quantity I guess. I really like some of the songs he cut.

Their is just something about this band and album, you can help bit like, as you listen to this album, and take on board the lyrics, the music, the vocals, and the great atmosphere as you check it out, wow, it's affection-us and the more you listen the more you love it. I would even go to say, this band makes great albums. going by this one..