Album Review
Cosmo Jarvis - Is The World Strange Or Am I Strange?Cosmo Jarvis - Is The World Strange Or Am I Strange?

With the jokily titled ‘Gay Pirates’, Cosmo Jarvis opens his sophomore album, but sounding like a cross between the upbeat folk nursery rhymes of Frank Turner and the twisted lyricism of Bright Eyes he ensures you aren’t laughing at him.

At least this is how the American born, British raised singer/songwriter starts his album, sadly it’s all sort of downhill from here to use an overused phrase. This innocent happy-go-lucky approach isn’t seen again as Cosmo Jarvis tries his utmost to cram as many different styles as he can into an hour and eleven songs, to what avail remains unknown.

Six minute title track ‘Is The world Strange’ is an epic slow rap with Mike Skinner story-telling. Quirky retro-fit noises litter the chorus of dull down-tempo singing while the verses are witty and flow as smoothly as the River Nile, it’s a perfect cross over pop song, making the start a force to be reckoned with. This courageous start makes the majority of the record that much more disappointing.

‘The Talking Song’ is a song that starts of exactly as it promises, with talking. It’s a shame then when anything other than this tries to live up to the ‘Song’ part of the title. This sort of indie ditty is something we have to live with these days and it’s always got some sort of political agenda, but Cosmo Jarvis doesn’t really know where to start with this and instead goes for the all-encompassing approach: “I can see myself in all of you and all of you in me, but a frightened little planet, most of all, is what I see.” It’s not exactly the marching rallying tunes of The King Blues now is it?

If you like electro than you’re in luck as Jarvis has gone and hooked you up with that too while he gives us all a vicarious look into the adolescent goings on at ‘Dave’s House’. The flamenco guitar here is slightly out of place and though the instrumentation of the last 30 seconds or so is interesting it isn’t in keeping with the tone of the song. This track really encapsulates the problem with the record. It could have easily been fabulous but instead of making great pop-songs the 22 year old musician has tried to write and compose in as quirky a way as possible and everybody hates a try-hard.

‘She Doesn’t Mind’ and ‘My Day’ are both decent enough, but they sound like they are made by a collection of other artists and for some reason stick the same reggae beat in the background. The latter is an aggressive punk montage on the state of the nation in our mindless generation, lyrics are spit and even screamed over daunting guitars, but it’s over five minutes when it should have been a fast and furious, dip your toe in the waters sort of thing.

Lyrically Cosmo Jarvis and Is The World Strange Or Am I Strange?is packed with nuggets that you could happily get on board with, even think about, but as a whole this is a sloppily packaged record that tries too hard to be too many thing and in doing so loses its identity.

2/5

Review by Lauren Mullineaux
 Band Members
Cosmo Jarvis - Band
Cosmo Jarvis
 Track Listing
1. Gay Pirates
2. Sure As Hell Not Jesus
3. Blame It On Me
4. Is The World Strange Or Am I Strange?
5. Dave's House
6. Let Me Out Of My Head
7. The Talking Song
8. The Wave That Made Them Happy
9. She Doesn't Mind
10. My Day
11. Betty
 Band Related Links
Cosmo Jarvis Myspace
 Review Score Code
- Top Cheese
- Brilliant
- Pretty damn good
- Ok I guess
- What Was That?