They didn’t name themselves The Isles for nothing. Less inspired by Brit Pop than the Pre-Madchester Manchester indie scene, no wonder the New York quartet’s record label describes them as “honorary Mancunians in spirit and sound.” The band certainly talk the Manc talk with guitarist/backing vocalist Ben Haberland revealing: “I’m very sensitive to heat. It renders me useless.”

One of the strongest tracks off their debut album, ‘Summer Loans’ is clearly a song for all seasons. Accompanied by ‘True South’ and ‘Pills From Mexico’, The Isles prove that the best things come in threes. Indeed, ‘Pills From Mexico’ sums up the whole band if you take Haberland’s interpretation of it as a song of praise for “consecutive hangovers, relationships gone awry, people that I thought I loved, people that I know I hate…constant duality in thought all mixed up with a bit of hope.”

Like their similarly NYC-based compatriot Adam Green, The Isles play pop music by its rules. Whilst surreptitiously subverting them. Or as that man Haberland again puts it: “We want to continue pushing the boundaries of what you can do in a simple song and ways that you can express the world at large and your place in it.”
(4¼/5)