Review Summary: An entertaining debut album filled with surprises
Rolo Tomassi. I think every modern rock fan has an opinion on the unpredictable, young Sheffield band. The bizarre “Nintendo-core” moniker given to the band has attracted masses of attention, as with their petit screamer, Eva Spence - but can they live up to the hype surrounding them?
For the majority of Rolo Tomassi’s debut album, “Hysterics”, it seems they warrant the attention given to them. The band have a truly unique sound, which is best represented by single “I Love Turbulence.” The song categorises their style perfectly, with brilliant riffs, brutal screams, time signature changes and even the occasional bit of delicate singing. However, Rolo Tomassi are far from a one-trick pony. “An Apology To The Universe” is an ambient interlude, which offers some much needed respite after a brace of particularly heavy songs. “Macabre Charade” expands the band’s palette even further, by providing an extremely eerie backdrop to some dynamic dual vocals from siblings Eva and James Spence, before giving way to some throat-shredding screams. Not only are the vocals brilliant, but the instrumentation is superb too. The guitars and drums are played with military precision and the keyboards really offer something special to the band.
However, as with most debut albums, “Hysterics” is flawed by inconsistency. “Fofteen” and “Everything Went Grey” add very little to the album, the former providing one scream-fest too many and the latter is just too long for an unoriginal interlude. If the album had perhaps been shortened a little by dropping one or two of the tracks, the album could have been vastly improved by giving the listener a far more focused record to listen to.
Overall, Rolo Tomassi’s debut is brimming with potential (as shown by “I Love Turbulence”), yet sadly the album contains a little too much filler. Nevertheless, I would recommend this album to any rock fan wanting something a little more diverse than the predictable radio-rock.
By Robin Joynson
