Los Campesinos! earlier this year released their third (or second depending on how you count it) album Romance Is Boring earlier this year and now here late in the summer they have released an EP containing some acoustic reworkings of some of the songs from that album. Los Campesinos! has always been a band that has excelled in a kind of more uptempo lo-fi/punk kind of sound built around wordy vocals containing some interesting and intriguing imagery so stripping away the more rock leanings of their sound certainly doesn’t immediately sound like the most natural change to make. They generally have some very loud and very rock moments in most of their songs, and this takes all of that out and focuses strongly on the guitar and the violin with some occasional piano mixed in. While it may not be a total winner on every track, it is an interesting change of pace for them and some of the songs actually work really well.
The songs that I think really excel on this disc are “Letters From Me To Charlotte” and “In Media Res” and I think it is no coincidence that they are probably the least straightforward songs of the four they picked to be on the EP. Both have a great feel and flow to them even without the full band sound and you can really pick up on a different nuance for both of them really well and they both still have great rhythm and pace to them. “In Media Res” specifically really shines with a whole new angle on a pretty broken up and multi-headed song. The emotional aspects of those songs may even come across better in these versions. “Romance Is Boring”, the first track on the EP, feels a little awkward and flat to me and doesn’t quite come off without that full band sound to hold it up. “Straight In At 101″ loses its strong pacing and rock leanings in this version but actually holds up pretty decently considering.
Generally, these are kind of reimaginings of the songs you already know from the last record, and if you are a big Los Campesinos! fan then these are a cool listen, but the EP as a whole doesn’t necessarily give too much. I think you really pick up on the violin work in this EP and it does show a softer, more measured side of the band that is really cool to see and on some of those tracks it is a really nice thing. If you really liked the album then you will probably like hearing these reworked versions, and while the new versions don’t appreciably change the songs that much, the difference in emphasis is cool to hear from a band generally thought of as pretty leaned towards the rock/punk spectrum of indie rock.
