Reviews
Review of 'Unfinished Drawings EP'
by
Peter J Brown
http://www.toxicpete.co.uk/
"Unfinished Drawings is a two piece, Toby and Tom, acoustic-rock-pop concern; using, in the main, two acoustic guitars, two fine voices, a few samples and some 'beats', Unfinished Drawings have contrived to come up with a very fresh and refined sound. Unfinished Drawings bend the rules of acoustic music to re-shape and re-energise - they don't, thankfully, break the mould altogether!!
This self-titled five track EP demonstrates Unfinished Drawings' super-cool songwriting and seemingly natural ability to get their distinctive sound onto disc without detriment to the overall lightness of feel or their wonderfully easy acoustic way. Unfinished Drawings keep it all beautifully honest and well matched to their excellent songs. Samples and other 'additions' are kept minimal allowing the natural timbre of the voices and guitars to stand proud and uncluttered. Unfinished Drawings have managed to balance real with synthetic and in doing so their songs have been enhanced without losing identity - less is definitely more in the case of Unfinished Drawings! However, one track in particular borders on being over-embellished; 'Verdana', although excellent takes Unfinished Drawings experimentation just about as far as it can go without falling foul of the 'too-much-tinkering' edict. Unfinished Drawings just get away with it but any more would be a bridge too far for my liking!
Unfinished Drawings' 'enhanced' acoustic music is delightfully rich in texture, vibrant and modernistic; the 'electronics' add colour where it's needed but don't cloud the issue. Tracks offered here are, 'Eloquently Forced', 'Dreaming', 'Nobody Knows It', 'Verdana' and 'Mistakes, Not Amends'; together they make a well-good introduction to a forward thinking and quite obviously talented duo - their refreshing take on acoustic music is inspired and inspirational - I'd like to think that Unfinished Drawings won't be drawn in to electro-overload - this is just fine the way it is and with their great songwriting abilities I'm sure that there's much more to come yet. I like it guys - it's bit like that old wedding day thing - something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue. So, keep on bending it boys but, for God's sake, don't break it - it's a fragile formula and you need to keep it safe and secure. Unfinished Drawings are pushing the acoustic envelope and if they can keep up this high standard, the future looks pretty rosy to me!!"
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Review of 'Unfinished Drawings EP'
by
Joseph C Seager
http://www.leedsmusicscene.net/
"Since their debut album back in
2007, Unfinished Drawings have had great exposure playing support
slots with Feeder, Boy Kill Boy and The Holloways. Adding a few
electronic beats and samples to their skillset, the Leeds-based
band bring out a new EP that shows how they've matured.
All their tracks have elements of beauty and simplicity. The acoustic
guitars combined with mellow vocal work and the addition of the
electronic bits and bobs not only make everything altogether more
interesting, but gives them an edge on acoustic act rivals on the
scene. It's music to relax to, to have an aged whiskey with rather
than a bottle of Thunderbird. Beep! Magazine say not to judge a
book by its cover and as I try not to, I wouldn't have thought that
music this exquisite would come from a couple of chaps, one who
looks like a 'road protester' and the other who is 'a cheeky faced
inebriate.'
'Verdana' opens sounding like a 90's video game whilst the vocals
throughout the EP are far superior to a vast array of artists currently
out there doing this in front of millions of people. I was worried
that the band may not correlate with my expectations, but they totally
do, and step way past my expectation line. I was drawn (ha!) to
the band due to their name, it conjured up splendour, magic, and
indeed music that could be played over animations of hand drawings.
That is what I expected. That's what I got, and I'm all the happier
for it!"
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Review of 'Unfinished Drawings
EP'
by Lucas Jubb
Beep! Magazine
"So this is what I‘ve come
to expect from Unfinished Drawings; two acoustic guitars, one lovely
soothing vocal, and..... computerised drum beats?! Ok so it’s
not what they usually do, but it shows progress, maturity and gives
the band a whole new fresh look.
Track one is too long, and to be fair that’s criticism of
nearly all the tracks on the EP. Track one is very repetitive and
towards the 3.30minute mark it becomes slightly boring, although
my eyes originally lit up at the sound of the electronics in the
song by the end I’m sadly bored.
Track two comes as some what a breath of fresh air. I think it is
a lot more interesting both melody wise and music wise. There are
more build ups and releases in the beats, which gives the song a
lot more power; it’s got a catchy chorus reminisant of the
older Unfinished Drawings songs like ‘I’ll Disappear’.
However I cannot help but think this track would be ten times better
one minute shorter.
On first listen to track three, I didn’t think that the soft,
soothing guitars mixed with the electronic beat, however after a
few more listens I realise that its adds power, energy and manages
to bring something different to the whole EP. Towards the end of
this five minute epic, I am very much reminded of Get Cape. Wear
Cape. Fly, but I suppose it’s hard not to be with acoustic
guitars and electronic beats.
Track four scares me, there is a terrible beep sound that plays
throughout the whole track, sounding like something from the old
War of the Worlds musical. Sadly I do think that that beep ruins
this marvellous song. If you look through the beep, this track is
definitely the best on the whole EP, it’s got an excellent
structure and pushes the band further than they have ever gone before.
More like this one please!
Something I have found throughout the whole EP, is that in some
places these electronic beats are just not needed. The perfect example
of this is track five, the final track. I think it would of being
nice to have an acoustic track at the end of the EP to cool things
down, this drum beat clashes against the slow, melodic acoustic
guitar that the track is built upon. 3.40minutes[ish] into this
track I find myself eating my own words, the track literally bursts
into a solid electro beat, the acoustic guitars are beaten like
animals. This last two minutes of the EP is the highlight of the
full 23.7 minutes of the EP. It throws the band into a whole new
dimension, puts them into a whole new category, and makes this EP
definitely worth listening to."
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Review of 'Unfinished Drawings
EP'
by Owen Paciuszko
http://godisinthetvzine.co.uk/
"With glitchy processed
drums jostling with sweetly strummed guitar, mixed in with strings
and lead singer Toby's vocals there's a sort of strange hybrid here
of Turin Brakes and Animal Collective by way of Starsailor, the
vocals sound very similar. Eloquently Forced is a lovely introduction
to this five track though, it's scattershot pop with electronic
sprinkles and though it's quite earnest it works.
This UK two-piece have filled this
EP with laidback guitars and dream-like beats in a fashion akin
to Morcheeba and, he says tentatively, Newton Faulkner (his cover
of Teardrop isn't as bad as I first thought). Some of the tracks
here though do drag and drift into 90s pop-tronica (is that a word?)
territory, but never unbearably so. Verdana inparticular mixes nice
bouncy synth with a epileptic drum-beat to great effect to come
out as the EP's strongest track.
This is an interesting release, especially
considering it comes from a two-piece 'acoustic' act and Unfinished
Drawings definitely warrant a little of your time."
4/5
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Review of 'Unfinished Drawings
EP'
by Jo Vallance
http://www.roomthirteen.com/
"Hard to pigeonhole,
Leeds-based band Unfinished Drawings’ latest EP is a mixture
of electronic beats and sighing vocals which have a slightly tendency
to lull the listener into a trance-like state. The band use electronic
samples mixed with acoustic guitars for an interesting sound, although
sometimes this just ends up sounding a tad wishy-washy.
Opener, ‘Eloquently Forced’
is interesting enough but unfortunately outstays its welcome a little,
lasting for 4 and a half minutes when 3 would have certainly given
it more punch and prevented the listener’s attention from
wandering.
‘Dreaming’ features pattering
beats against soft backing with an ethereal glaze, before some more
driven, pop beats kick in and up the pace. ‘Nobody Knows It’
has a beautiful chorus that blossoms from nowhere and takes you
by surprise, and it’s a pleasant one at that, with electronic
glory flowing over you. ‘Verdana’ doesn’t show
quite as much flourish or style as the font, and might feature some
trippy beats, but largely fails to take them anywhere productive.
Unfinished Drawings have enough interesting
ideas to create good experimental pieces of music, but they lack
strong melodies, which could transform the music into something
memorable. There’s plenty of potential here, but it just needs
a little tweak here and there to give the songs a real strength."
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Review of 'Unfinished Drawings
EP'
by James G
http://soundsxp.com/
"Now, this is a
bit different. Good different. Unfinished Drawings interest me,
as did Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly. when I first heard a song by them/him.
Further investigation after ‘The Chronicles of a Bohemian
Teenager Pt 2’ proved a disappointment.
Unfinished Drawings, though, have put together a self-titled EP
that starts well with ‘Eloquently Forced’, all insistent
harmonies and cyclical beats. It gets better with the caffeine-laden
‘Dreaming’ - ‘Dreaming of you is a regular routine’
- better still with ‘Nobody Knows It’, a track which
contains a killer chorus – gets a bit lost with the clumsy
‘Verdana’ but then delivers a knockout blow with the
glorious ‘Mistakes Not Amends’.
As for the future? Well, this Leeds
duo have been together for almost 4 years now, and this EP is nearly
brilliant. The overall sound – part GCWCF, part Climie Fisher(!)
and part Postal Service – is a breath of fresh air, and the
understated feel of the songs is engrossing. Maybe some more interesting
lyrical wordplay and less ‘tinny’ production could up
the ante enough to make the next 4 years something special…"
