THE SUBWAYS
Young for Eternity
Warner
· Underground rockers never take it off the rails.
It’s hard not to like the Subways at least a little. They have a clear knack for putting together solid riffs, and vocalist Billy Lunn walks the line between Stereophonic Kelly Jones’s early vocal-chord shredding and Liam Gallagher’s cocksure whine. Yes, that is a compliment.
Actually, the Subways are a lot like early Oasis – a group of brash young lads (or two lads and a lass in this case), determined to etch themselves into the annals of rock, by borrowing the best bits from their favourite bands. There’s very little trace of originality in the Subways’ sound, just distilled rock ’n’ roll designed to whip the crowd into a frenzy.
When the results are as pleasantly energetic as "Mary" and its rollicking ’50s rock ’n’ roll singalong chorus, that’s not a problem. But nothing else approaches that peak. "Young For Eternity," the title track, sounds so much like The Vines that it’ll only really appeal to those precious few who wish that Craig Nicholls would sing more songs about vampires. The rest of the tracks don’t ape their influences quite as blatantly, but there’s still an overriding sense of having been here before. It makes it easy to like the Subways a little, but next to impossible to care much more than that.
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