Album: The Last Shadow Puppets – Everything You’ve Come To Expect

A lot has changed for these two Indie heroes since their last release of ‘The Age of the Understatement’ in 2008. Miles Kane is no longer a shy stranger to the Indie music scene or being seen as Alex Turners protégée puppy. With his own successes such as ‘Come Closer’ and ‘Don’t Forget Who You Are’ since TLSP’s first release, and with Alex Turner growing ever larger with the Arctic Monkeys, this project was set up to be a spectacular pairing.

The album opens with ‘Aviation’, which feels somewhat familiar to that of a track that you’d hear from AM. ‘Miracle Aligner’ is up next, and again I’m taken back to the soundtrack of Submarine, at this moment in time I’m feeling like Alex Turner is just using up songs that didn’t quite make the cut of his other work.

The next few songs do start to take form on their own; mellow 60’s vibes come through especially in Everything You’ve Come To Expect. This song reminds me of something you’d hear at a fairground in an old film.  These similar 60’s/70’s strings and breathy vocals continue for the majority of the tracks, no future shout-your-heart-out-hits quite yet.

‘Bad Habits’ is next on the list, and probably their best from the album, it’s their most recent single from the album. It only took half the album to get a song that sounds exciting and has some back-bone to it. It’s at this point in the album where the tracks sound less of a whisper and more of a shout.

The next tracks are what I was hoping for from these two. ‘Used To Be My Girl’ sounds so much less melancholy and has a lot more oomph, and this then melts into tThe Dream Synopsist, which is the most relaxed and psychedelic on the album (but again sounds like something from Submarine).

It’s got to be questioned really, what does Kane really bring to this? Other than being a support singer and shouting a few random words here and there? (Sorry Miles.) You’d have thought after eight years of growing as musicians and having that much more experience under their belts that this album would have just a bit more substance.

But I guess if you had enough free time and such a dedicated following like Turner does, you have enough resources to release any crock of crap and it will still sell.

So is this everything I’ve come to expect?… I mean kind of, but I was hoping for a little more.