There’s something timeless about Reptar’s Body Faucet, which I hadn’t expected due to their buzz at SXSW. For some reason I assumed it’d be in the realm of Death Grips over Mystery Jets. I’ve had friends who’ve had bands named after things like dinosaurs and lizards and they’re usually quite aggressive. But I can’t help but feel that it’s one of a load of albums coming out which feature 0% in your face-ness.

The album is pretty long, another aspect defiant of its SXSW attributes. It’s 12 tracks and ten of those are over four-minutes. It’s possibly a sign that the band aren’t interested in being one of those three-minute pop throwaway types. The vocal sound has a Bob Marley –esque sound often found on house tracks – you know, ones which float around in Ibiza, not that the music here resembles that scene, just the vocals.

Houseboat Babies is more blatant with its use of the Marley vocal vibe, but with some super sickly ‘group’ shouty vocals – which can’t be called original as such – it’s like The Go! Team all over again. I’m going to check on Facebook to see who the cheeky tyke is pretending to be Bob Marley. It’s all in the throat really. I can hear it. Nice production though.

Many of the tunes remind me of MGMT, but more for a feeling of youthfulness and synth-drench rather than the experimental lo-fi edge MGMT achieved. Over all, the album features enough decent melody and musicality to warrant its existence, and some of the songs will work really, really well when released at the gates of summer for long teenage nights.

-Andy Halliday-