LEFT OF THE RIGHT SIDE
On first impressions, Left of the Right Side are a heard it all before heavy rock act. Their music owes much to the nu-metal sub-genre that exploded in the collective consciousness at the very beginning of the century (Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park and Papa Roach immediately spring to mind from those dim distant days).
It’s the standard stuff really: songs relying on a tried and tested loud-quiet-loud formula, chugging guitars, meandering bass lines, furious drumming and lyrics half shouted, two-thirds rapped and one-sixth sung. The banshee-like yelling of the line “Sing the song” on the album’s title track alone is a breach of the trades description act.
And yet… and yet there is something there. Well, more than something actually.
Received wisdom dictates that all bands of this type will, inevitably, have songs about being fed up and how no one understands them. The list of anthems for doomed youths (or, at least, youths who feel they are doomed), is endless.
So it’s a bit of a surprise to find Left’s album Sitting Targets opens with a refreshingly optimistic song called “Long Live Life” in which we’re urged to “stand up tall – the end is not to fear” because “a life like this can never be a mistake”.
To Left’s immense credit, the “why does no one like me?” songs (and they are there) are delivered with more eloquence than your average collective of enraged minstrels. “This Feeling of Nothing” sums up feelings of despair and despondency brilliantly: “Nothing this way is better today/nothing has meaning just take it away” while the overwhelming desire for peace and normality to reign in “Father Inferior” is palpable: “Don’t try to undo what’s done/we’re doing just fine/don’t try to win the day”.
Elsewhere, Left channel the spirit of Rage Against the Machine with a bit of revolutionary politics and rapping. “Sitting Targets” opens with an explosion of “Do you really know what’s going on?” before the lyrics take on a Braveheart-y feel with the line: “They can’t take away your freedom!”
Other songs on the band’s ten-track album revolve relationships be they current, former and hoped for. “Better this way (Good for me)”, the band’s break-up song is heavy rock’s answer to Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive” where the lyrics progress from “Can’t believe that you want it this way/go ahead just abandon me” through to “the time has come to say/I’m better off this way”.
But the most interesting of these songs are “Can’t Erase You” and “Serve Me Now” with their darker undercurrents. “Serve me now” is a song about bitterness following a relationship turning sour. Lines fluctuate between murderous thoughts (“Have fun drowning”) and a desire for complete mastery over the cause of the misery – which kind of explains the song’s title.
“Can’t Erase You” though has a different kind of darkness to it. Where “Better this way” was Left doing “I will survive”, this song is their “Every Breath You Take”. You know, the Sting song that newly weds often have for their first dance only to discover the song’s actually about stalking.
It’s the same here. “Can’t Erase You”, at first, sounds like a love song: until you hear the desperation of lines like “Darling, when you say you’re just not that into me/look deep into my eyes/there’s something there/I’m sure you’ll see.” Which becomes just a little bit creepy – especially when it precedes the shrieked lines of “Just let me hold you! Let me taste you!” Kinda creepy. I’ll be going now, if that’s ok.
The weakest song is “For You”, a quieter, acoustic guitar driven love song. There’s none of the darkness found in previous tracks. It is simply what it is.
And maybe that’s the problem. Without any of the depth and character found in the other nine tracks, this one feels a little limp, especially with the greetings card rhyming scheme found in lines like: “Yes I can seeeeeeee so cleee-arleeeeeee/you’re the one for meeeeeeeeee” and “sun arISE in my EYES”.
Musically, the album is full of interesting sounds and tunes to elevate Left above all the other nu-metallers out there. Between the chugging guitars and yelled lyrics, you’ll find traces of acoustic ska rhythms (“Done”) and sprawling instrumentals.
“Can’t Erase You” features an excellent guitar led interlude which will remind Porcupine Tree fans of “Russia on Ice”. Meanwhile “Father Inferior” begins with an extensive introduction beginning with a Flamenco inspired acoustic guitar, moving onto a distorted electric guitar before turning to an elegiac ’cello sound and then more familiar nu-metallic chugging noises.
Even on the weaker song “For You”, there is a gorgeous instrumental at the end which recalls The Eagles’ “Hotel California” and Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven”.
Despite the various strands and themes running through this album, there is a unity in Sitting Targets. Whether the songs concern themselves with the desire for democracy or the girl next door, there is a clear wish for things to be ok (or “better this way” as the song would have it): for things to be as they should be and for some sense of peace to be reached; even if it turns out (in one song at least) that these are the wishes of a psychotic stalker.
The yelling and caterwauling on the songs of many of Left’s contemporaries often sounds affected, but with Sitting Targets, you can’t help but feel they mean every single screech.
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Disclaimer: All comments and opinions are those of the writer.
4/04/2011 • Sitting Targets Album Review
By Stephen Morris • Photos by
One Response to “LEFT OF THE RIGHT SIDE”
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On April 4th, 2011 at 6:38 pm
Thank you so much for the review, I don’t know if I agree with you 100% on some things but it is nice to have a different perspective on our music and I am glad that, overall, you enjoyed our album!
One thing though, I am 99% sure that Rich never sings the words “sing the song” in any of the tracks on the album so would be interesting to see what lyrics you misheard there!
Thanks again,
Matt