Pete & and Pirates' Little Death

Thomas Sanders of Tap Tap (which I trashed last year in a Sun review), is now part of a newer band called Pete & the Pirates. Sanders has made huge improvements with this endeavor and I’m totally digging it. Even one song, “She Doesn’t Belong to Me,” that was originally billed with Tap Tap — which I didn’t like — I now like as a Pete & the Pirates.
The UK fivesome, composed of two Pete’s and assumingly three Pirates, are an indie version of popped-up punk. They utilize every instrument to create catchy staccato rock musical patterns. At times each of the instruments work together to perfectly create synched and undifferentiated noise (“Knots,” “Come On Feet,” “Bright Lights”), while on other songs specific bass, guitar or drum parts take a primary role (“Mr. Understanding,” ”Ill Love,” “She Doesn’t Belong to Me”).
Pete & the Pirates make the respective sounds of their instruments fit together as perfectly as WALL-E and EVE’s hands, and they do the same with their voices. In Tap Tap, Sanders’ solo high-pitched voice was borderline annoying. In Pete & the Pirates, the two Petes who play guitar and bass lend their lower-toned voices, creating a vocally balanced harmony.
Yet despite the cohesive of the instrumentals and the vocals, the lyrics are all over the place. On “Come on Feet” Sanders sings, “You don’t touch the phone / You stay at home / Your smile is fake / And I like your face.” That disconnect is pretty much reflective of the lyrical lacking of Pete & the Pirates.
But I’ll completely look past it, since this group makes wholly original music that is unlike any other band — unlike Tap Tap, which was just like every other band. For that I give much kudos to Thomas Sanders for such musical growth in such a short time and, as a result, made an album that is worth every listen.