The Stands – All Years Leaving (2004)

This is a kind of random album for me to own. I remember listening to just a few songs by this band before I had this album. It sounded quite alright, so when I saw this CD sold with a cheap prize in the end sale of a Helsinki based record shop, I decided to buy it. I have to say that I haven't really listened to this album that much, but it has some nice songs on it. The Stands is an English bands but their sounds are straight from the US. There are some strong country and Americana influences on this album. Wikipedia calls this music rock or alternative rock, but I would definitely call it alt-country. Most of the songs have neat interplay between acoustic and electric guitars. The leading vocals are sometimes slightly annoying because of strong nasal, but it's not too much when you've gotten used to it.



This band is from Liverpool and it sounds here and there quite a lot like another Mersey-band, The Coral. Especially the song Outside Your Door has similar kinds of rockabilly sounds. The country songs remind me more of early Wilco or The Jayhawks. I think the accent on the lead singer is the only giveaway that this is actually a UK band.

I had never seen a music video by this band before making this blog post. Now I found a music video for the song Here She Comes Again. This video is very retro, showing the band play live in a TV studio. This video along with the actual song reminds me quite a lot about the biggest Liverpool band of all times, The Beatles. I really think this is not unintentional either. The video is exactly like the videos in the 1960's.

It's Only Everything sounds a lot like 1970's Neil Young. Looks like the album really is a collection of different influences collected from the idols of the band. There's nothing wrong with good retro sounds, but I feel like there's not really that much originality with The Stands. It all sounds a lot like something else. What I really do like about this album is the authentic sound. The instruments sound very organic and it sounds exactly like it would live.

The last song of the album, The Way She Does, is a very different kind of song to all the others on this album. It's a longer song that has long psychedelic guitar solos. If the band were to make more music like this I feel like their albums would be a lot more interesting. I think they could improve a bit with their technical skills to properly pull off this psychedelia stuff, but at least this song shows that they're capable of improvising and coming up with surprising sounds.

I haven't really listened to this album that much, but now that I listen to it, I think I should give it another chance. I don't think it'll ever be anything special for me, but at least a selected couple of songs are good enough to go on some of my playlists.

Listen to the album on Spotify.