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Album Review

The Vaccines – “What Did You Expect From The Vaccines?”

So, here we have it, yet another indie rock band with bouncy, melody-ridden tunes, but are they adding anything new to an already saturated market? The Vaccines have only been around for a short period, in fact just two months short of a year. The London-based band consist of Justin Young, Árni Hjörvar, Pete Robertson and Freddie Cowan – brother of Tom from British alt-rock sensations, The Horrors.

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So, here we have it, yet another indie rock band with bouncy, melody-ridden tunes, but are they adding anything new to an already saturated market? The Vaccines have only been around for a short period, in fact just two months short of a year. The London-based band consist of Justin Young, Árni Hjörvar, Pete Robertson and Freddie Cowan – brother of Tom from British alt-rock sensations, The Horrors.

Ok, so they have a link with the current world of music, but again, does this alone prove their worthiness upon our ears? Of course not. It does not help their cause when in amongst their début album What Did You Expect From The Vaccines? are throw away pop-junk songs such as opener “Wreckin’ Bar (Ra Ra Ra)” and the painfully irrelevant ‘Wetsuit’ in which lead singer Young demands the listener to “put a wetsuit on” five times in total.

However, after picking out the few weak numbers, there are some fantastic indie anthems which are the defining factors for their relative hype and indeed a place on the BBC sound of 2011 poll. “If You Wanna” and the wonderfully accurate story of “Post Break-Up Sex” will be bounced up and down to at many a festival this summer, while the epic “All In White”, by far the most mature song, will leave hundreds in anticipation for more substance from The Vaccines in the near future.

So all-in-all, not bad, and well worth a spin or two on the old CD player, if yours is actually still working and not gathering dust somewhere in the attic. To describe The Vaccines in one sentence it would be: think of White Lies, without all the gloom and murkiness whilst throwing in a bit of teenage joy.

Track Listing:

01. Wreckin’ Bar (Ra Ra Ra)
02. If You Wanna
03. A Lack of Understanding
04. Blow It Up
05. Wetsuit
06. Nørgaard
07. Post Break-Up Sex
08. Under Your Thumb0
09. All In White
10. Wolf Pack
11. Family Friend

Run Time: 35:59
Release Date: 03.14.2011

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