Imagination can be a powerful deceiver as young Mr. Costello once pointed out. And he wasn’t wrong.
If you’re wondering why your reviewer is suddenly coming on all proverb-prone, well it’s because he just blammed this single by THE DRIPS into his overworked CD player and observed the nervy, staccato riffery, the smouldering rumble (along the lines of Editors or a better version of those dreadful twerps The Departure) and the throaty, imploring vocalist (Matt Caughthran) who – weirdly – sounds more like Jake Burns than the current horde of Tom Smith/ Tom Chaplin clones. All which is cool enough, I guess.
So it’s only when your reviewer does some research after the fact (look, it’s the Mark E. Smith method, alright?) that he discovers – when wondering whereabouts in the U.K The Drips are from – that this quintet actually hail from California. Oh right, well they don’t sound like it, but then neither did/do Moving Units, who sound(ed) like they could be mates of the Futureheads. Well, from certain angles when the light’s bad, at least.
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So the reality is this: The Drips formed in 2000 or thereabouts. They’ve kicked around, releasing tracks on compilations on labels such as Hostage and Basement and previously released one ‘proper’ 7” single called “Mexico”/ “All Kids Are Dead” in 2003, but it’s long-deleted, meaning that the curiously-titled “16,16, Six” is The Drips’ ‘official’ first single in England. So there we go. Glad we cleared that one up.
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