The Hoosiers
The Trick To Life

THE REVIEW

The Hoosiers are a London-based trio founded in 2003 and composed of Irwin Sparkes, Martin Skarendahl, and Alphonso Sharland.

Riding on the strength of the six hundred thousand copies sold so far in Great Britain of their debut "The Trick To Life," they are also gaining visibility here with two singles like "Worried About Ray," an ironic and fun catchy pop glimpse, and "Goodbye Mr. A," a bouncy mini-anthem indie rock accompanied by a highly successful and entertaining video clip (the track is also included in the soundtrack of the popular video game "Fifa '08"). Among their influences, they cite The Cure, Jeff Buckley, The Flaming Lips, and XTC. 

The Hoosiers, however, are also something else: "The Trick To Life" is a fun debut, well-played, charming enough and rich in remarkable melodic touches, starting with the aforementioned "Worried About Ray," cleverly placed at the opening of the work. The third single "Worst Case Scenario" follows more or less the blueprint of the first two excerpts (as does the title track), but it is enriched with claphands and various effects that make the whole canvas even more rickety.  

The slower and more introspective pieces, however, are the weak point of the album, perhaps not well taken care of and penalized by excessive use of falsetto by frontman Sparkes (see "Run Rabbit Run" or "Clinging On For Life"). "A Sadness Runs Through Him," on the other hand, is more successful, perhaps due to its typical Travis-like pace that makes it unique and special in the entire work, while "Cops And Robbers" is a candidate to become yet another smash hit of the band, since it will also be included in a video game (given the subject, this time it will be "GTA 4"). Beautiful and evocative are the atmospheres of "Everything Goes Dark," which builds its base melody on a delicate and harmonic arpeggio, then grows to a finale dominated by a blend of choirs, guitar, and strings. 

Regarding the name, Alphonso explains: "A Hoosier is a native of Indiana, the main grain-producing region of the American midwest, the place where we found ourselves again. Many Hoosiers claim the nickname comes from Samuel Hoosier: in 1825 they were nicknamed 'Hoosiers Men' for their qualities of courage and hard work. However, digging a little deeper, it turns out that the name is the distortion of the French translation of 'idler and agitator' and refers to a group of men of dubious morality. The ambiguity of its origins fascinated us, although the latter definition probably suits us better." 

Bands that disappeared after one/two/three albums, unfortunately, we've heard of many, especially in Albion's land. We will see if these Hoosiers will be one of the few exceptions.

Key tracks: "A Sadness Runs Through Him," "Cops And Robbers," "Everything Goes Dark"