The fresh energy of the “Village Fire” EP by James jumps out of speakers. You likely know James more polished and, at times, commercial sound (“Laid”, “Sit Down”, “Born of Frustration”), but this EP (which simply collected their first two single releases) catches them in their early days bursting with ideas.
These five songs always provide an exciting ride. While you would probably say it is folk-influenced at its core, the bouncy bass lines and bright ringing guitars take the music elsewhere. These tracks don’t have any real sing-along choruses, but there is lots of clever word play and humor throughout. (One favorite from “Folklore”- which seems to mostly be from the perspective of a boy absorbing advice and observations and trying to make sense of growing up – “…and women are a plaything that are just made for men, to treat how the boss he respect treats him…”) . A couple times (especially on the final song “Hymn From A Village”) singer Tim Booth sounds like he’s on the verge of becoming unhinged, but he hangs on and the tracks end before anyone gets hurt.