It’s a little revolution, but not an insignificant one. Imagine you’re in a room with five people all singing their hearts out, and their voices sound so good together, and their songs are filled with love and hope, and are about infatuation and music and friends and holidays and the weather and treating other people kindly. And their songs sound good, and make you feel good, and in that room you feel like the world is good, and people are good, and things are changing for the better. That’s what the little revolution of The Smittens’ new album is like. It’s a humble, friendly revolution, and sincere. On “Stop the Bombs”, a great bouncy little pop song, they sing outright for love over hate, for celebrating what we love instead of attacking others. “We only want to sing our songs for love,” they sing. And that feeling shines through on all their songs, even when they’re not making the point explicitly. Even when they playfully taunt others (“Guess what? You suck!”) it’s directed at stuck-up people who think they’re above saying “Hi” or being friendly. A Little Revolution is friendly to the point where upon listening to it you feel like you’ve made some new friends. All 13 songs are catchy, and sung with so much feeling that it’s tangible, you can feel it through the speakers. Sadness, too, is in their voices; it’s not all just outward cheer. When you look at a big grin for too long, you start to wonder whether it’s genuine. But the way the Smittens play and sing, you don’t wonder about it. There’s emotional depth to their voices, and to their songs, and as a band they can’t be reduced to cartoon characters in a sentence or two (using “cute” and “cuddly” and “twee” or other nice words that people often throw at gentle, pretty music to discount it). It has a warmer sound and better songs even than their last album Gentlefication Now!, which already was great fun. Pop quiz time: A Little Revolution is 1. A fabulous pop album, with great melodies and harmonies. 2. A half-hour celebration of music’s power. 3. A small, sincere call for people to be kinder to each other. 4. An epic party with your the closest friends you’ve never met. (No wrong answers in this class.)
