Kole McRae - Bob The Zombie

Hear The Track Here

By the looks of his Soundclick pages, Kole McRae has just pitched up here so it's a given that you won't have heard of him yet. Well, do the neighbourly thing and go over and see Hi, or if you are a fellow Canadian you can say eh?. Ahh, your face fell when I mentioned the C word didn't it? Because, like me, you are amazed at how many of them are online musicians and - much more scarily - how many of them are that good. Remember, if you will, that my own Artist of the Year 2006 was also a Canuck; Cam's Even Song.

It must have something to do with that mountain air....

Kole is an electronica artist although there may well be those who would dispute that. For people who like the bleepy side of life, this will sound like a pale imitation of the genre. More like one bloke with his keyboard. Materially too, Bob The Zombie is a pretty standard electro-pop tune that has lots of flaws but somehow manages to come out of the experience whole - provided that you understand that this is very much home made, and sounds it. Like many musicians recording material at home (or in the garden shed), songs and arrangements tend to sprawl, timings and tunings are suspect and (worst of all) some ideas that should have been left off the final mix somehow stay in to the bitter end.

Listening to Bob The Zombie isn't a bad experience, just raw. I liked the approach to the song and - given some practice - the vocals should really power the song. The voice stretches noticably but nonetheless still manages to carry it off. Musically, this is pretty pedestrian with a mix to match, and the ending vocal acapella really should have been left off - as should have that extremely irritating crash cymbal that obstructs almost everything in its path. It might have seemed like a good idea while making the track but is incredibly irritating after a few plays. All in all, this track shows that, despite everything, Kole has something to offer - hopefully as a serious musician. Here on Soundclick, as everywhere else in life, presentation is pretty much the whole game; it has to sound good enough for the listener to want to keep playing it.

Still, it's early days yet, and Kole may yet surprise us.