Cheerbleederz - 'Faceplant' EP Review

Tracklist:

1. Staying Up Late

2. Don't Hesitate

3. Thinking Of You

4. Cabin Fever

When I was younger, I really wanted a toy plane. Not just any toy plane, I’d seen an advert for one; it flew, had buttons that did all sorts of amazing things, and just looked like the most amazing thing ever. It looked like the toy that would change my life. As Christmas approached, having written my letter to Santa, I could barely wait till Christmas morning when I’d run downstairs, and be like the child playing with the plane in the advert; my life would be complete. So, when that Christmas morning came, and I ran downstairs to see a large present under the tree, which looked like it might contain a plane, I could barely contain myself. I ripped open the paper, and there it was- the present of my dreams. I took it out of the box, and started pressing the buttons, to see which one would make it fly. Only it didn’t fly, and the buttons weren’t actually buttons, they were just stickers. Although it was a very nice plane, it’s fair to say that it didn’t live up to my expectations, because it didn’t do what I wanted it to. It didn’t do anything.

Which, unfortunately, brings me to Cheerbleederz’ debut EP. I was excited about hearing this Indie Punk offering, and really hoped that it could be something special, and for about the first 30 seconds of opening track ‘Staying Up late’, I thought it was. There’s a chiming lead riff and percussion intro, before the vocals come in. And, oh what vocals. Sophie MacKenzie’s Pipettes-esque voice really is something else and, with the right song, it could be amazing- but this wasn’t the right song. The chiming riff continues and continues and continues, and the song just doesn’t really go anywhere, or do anything.

‘Don’t Hesitate’ has a much more interesting guitar part, as does ‘Thinking Of You’, but the songs themselves just don’t move up to that next level that I feel they could, it’s like they need a kick up the arse into a decent chorus, but it just never comes. The final track ‘Cabin Fever’ is the highlight for me, and I wonder if I might have felt differently about the record, had this one come first. There’s a definite purpose to this song, and the crescendo into the impassioned lyric “wish I could tear the skin right off my arms” does start to move me, make me feel like there’s a purpose to the record, but by this point it’s too late. And then it’s all ruined by the repetitive close to the song, with the line “I think that we’re all doomed” repeated so many times that, frankly, it starts to feel a little awkward.

I listened to this EP so many times, in the hope that I would have an epiphany, that I’d see what they were getting at, and that really it was the record I hoped it would be. But it didn’t do anything and it didn’t go anywhere, other than (like the toy plane) back in the box.