“Doubt and thou shalt be corrected.”

That’s perhaps not the greatest philosophy to believe in when you’re a person who outwardly advocates positivity, but you’d be surprised at how often these words have crossed my mind these days. I’ve found myself in chance situations where something that is seemingly doubtful works out for the better and the discovery of SWTHRT’s Compact Disc is a prime example.

I think you can always get a sense of a band from the name and while I still don’t understand the cryptic meaning behind SWTHRT’s moniker, the first time around it gave me a bad feeling. However, once I actually took a turn to listen to the album, I was pleasantly to the point of unnervingly surprised.

SWTHRT have got that great echoing vibration to their music which is definitely reminiscent of bands like The Cure, Joy Division and to a further extent, The Velvet Underground. So right off the bat, you’re on the money if that’s your sound of preference. The hypnotic, continuous beats and ‘glitter raindrops on roses’ effect of the twanging synth guitar is not actually an uncommon thing seen in the realms of alternative music today. The Horrors strayed from their incessant skinny-jeaned screeching to do something like it on their album Primary Colours, yet I will come right out and say that SWTHRT do it better.

The advantage SWTHRT have over a band under such reverence as The Horrors is you don’t actually spend much time trying to decipher SWTHRT’s garbled, nonsensical vocals. The vox become the very central nucleus of the instrumental orchestration, as they should be. It’s not a message screeching over some beautifully arranged music, but rather the very heart of said beautifully arranged music. The effect is soothing, overall - for your best example, see “Boys With Problems” and “I Am In Misery”.

As Compact Disc progresses as an entire record, it definitely becomes more of an abstractional art piece. The instruments seem to blur further into each other, apart from the drums which run strong with the most outward and consistent of sounds. The first weakness I spotted with it was the arrangement of songs seemed to be almost jerkily put together. The first four tracks seem to be one large similar block until “So Dumb”, which is number four, breaks out and puts a rough stop to the progression.

However, what redeems this disorganization is track number five, “Maggie Valley”. It’s an ethereal tune dipped deep in sentimentality, complete with tapping tambourines not unlike something Moe Tucker of the Velvets would use. Vocal free and fancy free, it has the whimsy of an essential album’s ice breaker.

From then on, the tracks just seem to get better and better. “Aloha Y’all” sounds like Beefheart being played backwards in the Valley of the Dead - creepy, trippy and entirely enticing.

My personal favourite track is “Terror Dread”, merely because the beginning sounds like the theme to a whacked out film noir - say, Noseferatu by Dario Argento. The vocals come to the fore in this track, making it the perfect combination of winning suspense and spine-tingling distortion.

All of that being said, I must return to my original point of the similarity between SWTHRT and bands like The Cure. Initially, that’s exactly what you think and that may make you believe you’re setting yourself up for the fall of yet another Robert Smith coverband, but I implore you to listen on. SWTHRT may keep a very constant style throughout the album but upon multiple listens, they appear as clear chameleons that shift slightly to fit the new enviornment of each song.

By the way, keep an eye out for the closing track “Sunroof” - it’s a killer.