Rogue Traders – Here Come The Drums album review

Everybody needs good Neighbours

There are many reasons why we love Neighbours – the cheesiness… the predictability… the good, the bad and the ugly in terms of acting skill. And, of course, the massive contribution it makes to music, and no I don’t just mean that immense theme tune. From Dame Kylie, Natalie Imbruglia and Holly Valance (check out her second largely-forgotten album by the way, it’s really good) to various forgotten 80s stars, Oz just keeps on giving.

And now to add to that stellar list, we have the Rogue Traders, consisting of three blokes who definitely aren’t in Neighbours and one lead singer who definitely is, with this debut album showing how successful Natalie Bassingthwaite’s metamorphosis from skanky OTT bitch Izzy to snarling rock chick manages to be. Well, it’s brilliant.

You won’t find a summer album with much more punky punchy energy than Here Come The Drums. Bassingthwaite turns her acting dial to ‘rock chick’ and the resulting voice sounds great, perfect for this band’s blend of raucous rock-pop-punk-dance. The whole sound is fresh, horrifically catchy and thoroughly deserving of massive success.

Debut single Voodoo Child is an ideal sampler of this peculiarly successful hybrid, with a hook that crawls into your head and, like a squatter, refuses to leave. Watching You, with its sample of one of the best rock songs ever (My Sharona, which has ‘influenced’ i.e. been stolen from about one in every five songs since) could hardly fail and Way To Go! is a

frenetic tour-de-force. OK, so it’s all in a similar vein, but when it’s this good, who’s complaining? Indeed, the slower songs are probably the closest this album comes to having a weakness.

With Bassingthwaite proving an enigmatic and charismatic front-woman (there’s a bit in White Lightning when she coos ‘Where are you?’ that makes me go all tingly) and a catalogue of great catchy songs, it looks like we can proudly add another name to the Neighbours music legacy.