The Little Ones
Morning Tide
Release Date: Oct 7, 2008
Genre(s): Indie, Rock, Pop
Record label: Chop Shop
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Album Review: Morning Tide by The Little Ones
Satisfactory, Based on 4 Critics
Based on rating 7.5/10
It’s an old story: young band signs with big label, makes a record of stunning, infectious pop music, and then big label drops young band, which then falls into a shadowy obscurity that is only occasionally broken up by the slats of dusty sunlight that peer into the used bin. If there’s any justice in the music world, the Little Ones will not end up that way. The band was dropped from Astralwerks earlier this year after releasing the Sing Song EP in 2006.
Based on rating 3/5
The Little Ones' agenda is to make angst-free pop - a song only makes the cut if it first makes the band dance. This debut ticks both boxes. Every song is a sugarcoated mood enhancer, with harmonies and hooks reminiscent of the Shins and Magic Numbers and the clean lines, vivid colours and California sun of a Hockney painting. The fuzz-rock bass of Everybody's Up to Something surprises, and Boracay sounds like Vampire Weekend on vacation in paradise.
Based on rating 5/10
The Little Ones' debut EP, 2005's Sing Song, was the kind of bright, sunny indie pop that earned the band comparisons to the Shins -- the peppy and lighthearted sound of the disc was happier than the Shins and had a pleasing spark of originality. Three years on, the band made it through some wrangling and ended up on Chop Shop Records for its debut full-length album, Morning Tide. The label is important in this case because it is helmed by Alexandra Patsavas, the person responsible for providing the music for TV shows like The O.C.
Based on rating 5.0/10
The Little OnesThese Little Ones have some growing up to doDropped by Astralwerks, after having recorded only one EP last year, this LA-based band recently caught the attention of Chopshop Records with a winsome sunshine-y sound that often recalls ’70s-pop staples like The Raspberries, Big Star and Badfinger.found some of the Flaming Lips’ animal suits discarded in a dustbin, put them on, and spent the next 11 songs spinning relentlessly cheerful yarns that blur together like the lines of an epic poem—a cartoonish rock Iliad sung in freakish, sped-up unison. Creating a musical theme that stretches across the album isn’t a bad idea, but The Little Ones fail to pull it off, and the songs suffer from a frothy sameness. .