The Joy Formidable The Big Roar (Canvasback/Atlantic Records)
4/5
By: Rachel Bolland
One of my overriding memories of work experience at the NME back in September 2008 was being asked to research a town in North Wales named, very beautifully, Mold. This was because an up and coming band from the small Welsh town called The Joy Formidable were doing a session for NME radio and that obviously meant the presenter needed some fun facts about Mold. From what I can remember, The Joy Formidable were by far the most interesting thing about it.
Two years down the line and the Welsh three-piece releasing their first full-length offering, The Big Roar. And bugger me, what an offering it is. This record manages to grab you from the very beginning, with no real let up in the size of the arrangements or the scale of the sound. They are, at their heart, a rock band, but there’s nothing generic about them - front woman Ritzy Bryan’s electrifying vocals bring an edge to the record that few bands manage to capture, particularly on tracks like ‘Buoy’ where the female vocals wonderfully offset the loudness of the instrumental and stop it being messy.
One of the defining characteristics of The Big Roar is the way in which each instrument is allowed its chance to take the lead. The bass isn’t forgotten about, playing a huge part in tracks like ‘Austere’, while the drums on ‘The Magnifying Glass’ become the focal point. And although at points the rush of sounds coming at your starts to sound suspiciously like noise, it’s always very manicured noise. The Joy Formidable are perfectly in control of what’s going on. There’s no mess, it’s a perfectly slick operation. Admittedly by the time you reach the end of the twelve tracks, you might feel the need to sit in silence for a bit and give your ears a break, but there’s never any question of stopping the middle - the pace of the record won’t let you.
They may come from Mold, but there’s nothing stagnant about this three piece. They’ve managed to produce one of the boldest, freshest debuts of this year. And it’s only February.
Artists in this article: The Joy Formidable
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