FEEDER - POLYTHENE
At university
they had a CD sale in the Union , which
saw many albums from different eras going on sale for as little as £3. Sadly,
there was no new music in stock, as the whole point was "shifting
stock" and getting rid of what was left. I saw this as an opportunity to
invest in some classic albums that I currently didn't own, and I took it. Among
a swarm of CD's I bought from the likes of Oasis, Kasabian and The Prodigy, I came
across Feeder's first album Polythene.
I had been aware that Feeder had a grunge background, having previously included the melancholy 'Suffocate' in one of my previous posts. I however, only owned one of their albums, which was their 'The Singles' - essentially a greatest hits, and I rate that album very highly; it contains some absolutely fantastic songs, but I digress.
I sort of knew what to expect when I uploaded this to iTunes. I expected dirty guitars, crashing drums and Cobain-esque snarls, and lo and behold that is what I got... and SO much more. If you fools only know Feeder for their chart-humping pogo-workout 'Buck Rogers', then it is time to listen a bit closer.
Opener 'Polythene Girl' is a fantastic introduction to the band, clearly highlighting their inspiration to make loud noises, but also a catchy chorus, which has since become a staple of Feeder's catalogue. Swooping through the album and Grant Nicholas' composition fails to disappoint. He knows how to structure a song well, and while he is not exactly Clapton on the guitar, he definitely has the right playing style to fit in with the rhythm section of Taka Hirose and the late Jon Lee. When 'Suffocate' came on, I noticed it wasn't the 'Suffocate' I'd come to love, but was altered slightly. This one was built around a single acoustic guitar with the same lyrics, just fiddled around differently. I must say, while this one is still beautiful, it sadly could not top the official single release. Nicholas knows how to right a damn good riff, as demonstrated on 'Stereo World' and 'Tangerine', with the former bearing a slight resemblance to 'Headup' by Deftones with a Drop-D nutcracker, and 'Tangerine' sounding like a Smashing Pumpkins release from 'Siamese Dream', which is definitely a good thing.
When this album was released back in 1997 (I was only very young at this time), I can only picture critics likening this to a Smashing Pumpkins rip-off, which is never something that new bands want attached to them - the dreaded 'rip-off' tag. Feeder showed their grit though and took advantage of such information by building themselves a British fanbase, and lingering on the success of single 'High', an American fanbase. Smashing Pumpkins were very popular at the time across the pond, leading to Feeder being dubbed as the successors to their gloomy-grunge crown (having said that, Feeder did have a more positively-endeared vibe to their tunes). This will go down as one of my favourite debut efforts around, and even listening to 'Forgive' whilst I type this final sentence, I'm managing to sing along nicely to these memorable lyrics. It is therefore no surprise to me then that magazine Metal Hammer rated this as their 'album of 1997'.
Listen to: Polythene Girl, Radiation, Tangerine
For fans of: Smashing Pumpkins, Nirvana
Rating: 9/10
