Maximo Park - 'A Certain Trigger' (Warp) Released 16/05/05

Maximo Park are from the north-east of England and have songs brimming with intelligence, ideas and post-punk energy. Sticking them in the same box as The Futureheads is easy, but - whisper it quietly - Maximo Park might just be even better.....

Frontman Paul Smith has an illuminating and original vocal style, part white boy soul, part "takes-it-too seriously-but-****-he's-good" karaoke singer. Debut single 'Apply Some Pressure' is jerky, driving pop elegance, whilst 'Graffiti' spawns the quite fantastic line "I'll do graffiti if you sing to me in French/what are we doing here if romance isn't dead."

Maximo Park succeed in conveying everyday feelings of loss and regret yet in alignment with an attitude of “**** it, let’s carry on,” The searing lament of ‘Going Missing’, is as bouncy as Patsy Kensit on a morning jog, even though it begins and ends with “I sleep with my hands across my chest/and I dream of you with someone else.”  Dark.

The only time ‘A Certain Trigger’ disappoints is with the languishing, dreary spoken word dirge ‘Acrobat’, which offers the conclusion that 80’s influenced Arab Strap pastiche should not be included on this or indeed any other album...ever.

Its inclusion looks explicitly like an example of dry Geordie humour when it’s followed by the rip-roaring riot of ‘Kiss You Better’. Sounding like end music to a film with an implausibly happy ending, Smith somehow throws in “I think we should compile a list/of places that we shouldn’t go.” Go into Maximo Park’s world however, and you will discover a truly sparkling debut that does not dissapoint, much.