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Tokyo Police Club

Elephant Shell (Saddle Creek)

By Soo Oh
Published: May 8th, 2008 | 3:14pm

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The debut album that fails to live up to the promise of preceding EPs is a modern music cliché regrettably grounded in reality. Not to say that Elephant Shell, Tokyo Police Club's longer-than-long awaited follow-up to their precocious EPs, is a catastrophe; in fact, it's nothing short of polished indie fare.

But ay, there's the rub.

It wasn't quite hype, but the Canadian quartet — their name's a misnomer among the ranks of Sweden's I'm From Barcelona and Australia's Architecture in Helsinki — had a lot to live up to. The songs on A Lesson in Crime (2006) and Smith (2007) mostly clocked in under the three-minute mark and held the youthful abandon manifested in the band members, who were orphans merged from prior disbanded lineups. Short and punchy, each track raced ahead without bothering to look back.

Elephant Shell also leaves behind something to desire, though doubtfully with the same intent. There's nothing really wrong with songs like "In a Cave" and "Graves," but they sound bland and uninspired when compared to A Lesson in Crime's winsome dissonance and imperfections. It's perplexing, as if all the popularity and touring smoothed over the band's rough edges during recording.

First single "Your English Is Good" was released nearly a year before the album, and it shows: Dave Monks sneers the title lyrics, his distinctive nasal vocals stretching to hoarse limits over Josh Hook's melodic guitar riffs. "Oh, give us your vote… if you know what's good for you!" the band taunts. It's a cutting little song, equal parts willful and bewildered, that hints at what could have been.

Did the band actively try to sound like everyone else, or did some suit at Saddle Creek stick the record through an easy listening, "Shins"-type ProTools filter, all the while rubbing his hands and conniving to squeeze some extra dollars out of the mainstream? Whatever happened — it's too bad. Elephant Shell won't change your life, but hopefully it'll convince Tokyo Police Club to change labels.

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