In the post-OK Computer wasteland that has been the British rock scene the past few years, a glimmer of hope still remains. A select few highlights on the horizon - barely noticeable to the naked ear - shine forth with brilliance and clarity, and one of them is Alfie's if you happy with you need do nothing.
The Manchester quintet - Lee Gorton, vocals; Ian Smith, guitar; Matt McGeever, cello; Sam Morris, bass; Sean Kelly, drums - seem like the least likely band to start any sort of revolution of the senses.
None of them, except maybe the cello player, are all that proficient with their instruments. While the lyrics are good, they offer no especially beautiful or philosophic quality. Actually, no technical ability about Alfie would separate it from any other band. So where does pleasure for the band's music stem from, you ask?
The light that shines forth from Alfie is a light of honesty, a light of willingness. The technical limits of Alfie are well known by the band and instead of attempting to achieve the pie in the sky that is way too high, Alfie's members embrace these shortcomings and let their lives fill the music in spite of their limitations. These guys make it fun to plunk out a few sloppy chords on an old acoustic; they make it fun to enjoy simplicity. They offer no restraint or hesitation. ClichÇs are neither avoided, nor indulged. Their joy is unbound and not related to an aesthetic or social standard. The pure experience of people relating to music without abstraction is evident in Alfie's music. If you happy with you need do nothing is a vivid portrait of the warmest yellows of happiness. All the songs are mostly slow in tempo but carried with enough lyrical gusto to make the pace very brisk and energizing.
Most notably, the textural palate is extremely large for a rock band. Alfie weaves different fabrics of sound into each piece as if they were cooks brewing up a 10-course meal with every song. This feast, with a style reminiscent of Tortoise and Mogwai, gives you a full taste of Alfie.
Realistically, these guys will not make much of a contribution to the evolution of pop music. They do not possess enough savvy and intelligence to take on the larger monsters plaguing the popular music of today.
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What Alfie does, however, is bring forth the option of people living through the music again. These are not people who are in a band because they want to identify themselves with the material associations of music - beer, chicks, money, reputation, etc. These are people who love to play and to live.
Alfie is a good band whose music does not need my questioning. All things have their limits, and I respect the honesty with which the band presents its boundaries. I can only imagine the potential for beauty in all of us, let alone in music, if we were all as forthright about our shortcomings.
