Honeyblood – “Honeyblood” Album Review

Honeyblood’s debut reminds me of  Veronica Falls’ Waiting for Something to Happen, some Icona Pop, Widowspeak, and a splash of The Breeders and Yuck. It’s a mish-mash of sounds and ideas while still maintaining a really cool sound that should be praised but falls under the umbrella of most household names in indie pop.

The sound is praise-worthy and the production for most of the songs sounds like the crunch of leaves from fall; it’s brittle, it’s loud and it’s something to marvel at. The drums crash and the guitars have a great dynamic between the grind of the tracks themselves and the chorus effect staple. You can hear the little influences with the slow, headbobbin’ grooves of the guitar and the vocals that seem angelic and juxtaposed with the devilish production.

The songs have an immediate punch to them- while they don’t get as loud as bands like The Men and My Bloody Valentine, they have a power to them that makes you feel “just punk enough”. “Biro” and “(I’d Rather Be) Anywhere But Here” take it a bit smoother with catchy indie-pop lyrics talking about the problems of the past and the overall ennui of life, love and hometowns. But that’s where the umbrella comes in.

Most indie pop has had these lyrics about leaving home and missing someone and complaining about no change and complaining about change, the whole spiel is getting very old and I want a little edge and variety with my indie pop nowadays. “Fall Forever”, “Killer Bangs”, “Choker”, “No Spare Key”, “Joey” they all have just about the same theme and if you’ve never heard of Honeyblood you’d just think it was the indie pop Pitchforked flavor-of-the-month.

Final Verdict: As amazing as it is to listen to the instrumentation and clever breaks and vocal melodies that fill this album, digging any deeper isn’t going to yield a diamond. You’ll find some garnet and some cubic zirconium, but nothing that’s worth as much as it was years ago.