“I will speak now,” the Spring Offensive declares over reggae grooves and chiming guitars on their debut full-length album, Young Animal Hearts. After five years of blistering performances and staggering singles, the Oxford, England indie rockers are given time to speak here. Eleven songs make up Young Animal Hearts, 11 songs were collected over the years and make up something more akin to a greatest hits than simply a debut album.
This might be because many of the songs on this album have had formal releases before. Five songs, ranging from the opener “Not Drowning But Waving” to the haunting “The River,” have been released as digital singles over the course of the months building up to Young Animal Hearts.
Each song maintains a single-like urgency, but also an emotional strength that comes with the personal album cuts that stress music over appeal. Songs like “The River” and “Speak” move with smooth-yet-haunting melodies that stick with a listener, engrossing them within stories about self-searching and realization—grand ideas within grand songs.
Few of the songs on Young Animal Hearts are stagnant. Take the opening track, “Not Drowning But Waving.” The song starts with heartstring-picking acoustic guitars before a bass line and drumbeat begin building up the song into its droning chorus and a feedback-drenched, chant-filled finale.
Each song plays out this way; there’s a barebones approach to an introduction before subtle not-so-subtle touches are added until the songs’ full-sounding conclusions top them off. These built-up moments occasionally slow down, allowing the verses to tell their stories. But, even then, a second verse almost always features something the first didn’t have, whether it’s the Edge-like guitar chiming on “52 Miles” or the shuffling drums on “Cut the Root.”
Rarely do the songs feel slow. Only “Carrier” totally fails to capture the dynamics of the rest of the album. Otherwise, it’s the individual parts of the songs that drag on the album as a whole, like the obnoxiously repetitive palm muting in the verses on “Something Unkind.” These do little to derail the more grandiose moments of Young Animal Hearts, though.
Spring Offensive’s debut is a powerful collection of singles. There’s little to derail the emotion and dynamics behind it. The song “Young Animal Hearts” has the quintet saying they want to fit in. Luckily, their animal hearts have different plans for them.
Rating: A-
