More Cowbell: London Two Piece Bear Their Skeleton Soul

Stoke Newington duo Cowbell are set to release their second album, “Skeleton Soul” on Monday 29th September. Their debut LP “Beat Stampede” was one of my albums of 2012, and was a sixties-tinged garage rock classic.

Let’s do a quick recap for the uninitiated and for those with poor memories and/or short attention spans:

• Cowbell were formed in 2009 and consist of Jack Sandham on guitar and Wednesday Lyle on drums.
• Wednesday taught herself how to play by playing along to songs on her iPod Classic. You know, the one with the click wheel. Yes, they’re *that* retro.
• Self-released debut single “Oh Girl” surfaces in 2010.
• “Never Satisfied” released on 7″ on Too Pure records the same year, limited to 500 copies. I have a copy…one day it will be worth millions…
• Cowbell sign to Damaged Goods.
• Slide guitar storming single “Talulah” released supporting debut album “Beat Stampede” in 2012.

“Skeleton Soul” is a great follow up. Fans of the garage rock singles from the debut album will love the 2 minutes and 12 seconds of  “Shake the Blues” and “Baby It’s Your Love”, which is exactly one second briefer. I love songs that don’t outstay their welcome.

However, the Cowbell musical palate has expanded on album No. 2 with the spaghetti western introduction of  “Cry Wolf”, whilst there’s a fuzzy, psychedelic set of keys being played on “She’s All Over You”.

After praising the brevity of these stomping garage rockers, it’s a surprise to find myself thinking that perhaps the best song on the album is the atmospheric ballad “Darkness In Your Heart”, a wistful, beautifully crafted song all the better for being sandwiched in between those bone-jangling garage rock numbers.

In the spirit of the album as a whole, I’ll be concise and stop before this turns into an album review. I’m a rubbish record reviewer.

Here’s what we need to know:

Cowbell is back. The new album is great, and the duo are playing The Lexington in Islington on Friday 10th October.

Here’s the video to “She’s All Over You” which neatly sidesteps the problems faced by most two-piece bands in the way that Phil Collins solved the issue of being a solo singer in “You Can’t Hurry Love”…