Mid Reflection - 'Outcast' EP Review

Tracklist:

1. Outcast

2. Illusions

3. Legalise It

4. Foes

Hailing from that there London, Mid Reflection throw elements of Punk and Ska into a pot and season with a dash of Rap to produce a distinctive sound. Having built up a live following, the four piece now release their debut EP 'Outcast' in November.

Consisting of the eponymous 'Outcast', 'Illusions', 'Legalise It' and 'Foes' it offers a good insight into the band and their outlook on life. I did fear, having read the press release, being confronted with something along the “Chickity China, the Chinese Chicken” line but these were totally unfounded. The refreshing thing about the EP is the accessibility and honesty of the lyrics (oh, and a name check for Kenny from South Park never hurts), tackling topics such as bullying, depression and friendships gone bad with bluntness and just enough humour to endear. You can tell that vocalist Matthew Bishop, aka 2T’z, has lived through these things and come out the other side, rather than phoning it in like a lot of other bands do. Having already namechecked 2T’z, the other members of the band – David Bean (drums), Martin Velicky (guitars) and Nathan Neumann (bass) - deserve a mention for the quality of the tunes, which have genuine earworm potential.

Stand out tracks for me are 'Foes' and 'Illusions', while 'Outcast' has a beautiful guitar bit that Edwyn Collins would be proud of. 'Legalise It' suffers from my prejudice about any song that has that kind of title but if you ignore that it’s also a good song, though the machine gun delivery of the lyrics is a tad too much for me…but hey, what do I know? It’s still a good enough song to make me want to try and Google the lyrics.

Having been confined to London and the South East thus far with their live shows, I’m looking forward to them heading north of the border in the future. If the rest of their repertoire is as good as these four tracks, it’ll be a brilliant night.