Based in London, but with their personnel originally hailing from exotic places such as North Wales and South Africa (Durban), AT THE LAKE's debut single "These Days" makes a confident, old skool noise that will surely curry favour with anyone who's dug the urgent, furrowed brow excitement of bands such as Interpol and Editors over the past 12 months or so.
ATL formed a mere 18 months back, but have been making important strides since cutting their gigging teeth back in March. They won an Xfm Unsigned competition in June and made their first festival appearance at Hyde Park's Wireless in July. They've obviously taken the important things on board, too, for "These Days" makes a mockery of their status as recording studio rookies. It's buoyed up by Warren Peddie's crisp drumming and Shaun Cairns' heavy bass chug (that's gotta be a Rickenbacker, surely?) while Tim Buckland and James Machin's guitars make like jets of icy water and singer Matt Forder perfects his Tom Smith-style little-boy-lost-pouring-out-his-heart vocals to fine effect.
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B-side "Wide Eyes" confirms the good impression with big, expansive, Chameleons-indebted guitars and an unlikely, but apparently inherent funkiness lurking gamely in the wings. Yes, I agree it's more of an impressive deviation from a tried and tested style rather than anything new and remotely radical, but At The Lake do it well and suggest their loud, proud landscape may well become a beauty spot to spend many a lovelorn afternoon in the near future.
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