Proud Mary, 'Love & Light' (Redemption) Released 17/05/04

It really should come as no surprise that a band brought to the world's attention by Noel Gallagher are bland, retroist, plagiarising drivel. What does come as a surprise is that Proud Mary are so bland, retroist, plagiarising and drivel-like, that they make Oasis sound like Kid 606. 

3 years have passed since Proud Mary’s debut release The Same Old Blues, but yet they remain adamantly stuck somewhere around 1971, delivering The Same Old Bilge.

Opening tracks Love to Love You and Hats Off! loiter cautiously just outside the entrance of the pub back-room, strumming inoffensive indie-pop.  But by the time we reach the third track Love and Light, it becomes clear that Proud Mary cannot live the lie any longer and woah! dive headlong into solid pub-rock territory. It’s a gruesome affair, all hackneyed chord sequencing and vocal harmonising (dis)pleasantries.

Going retro is all well and good if you’re going to deliver nuggets of pure pop innocence, untainted by modern-day superfluousness. Not so well and good if you’re going to come up with this sort of vacuous nonsense.