Man In the Machine

Album Review

If you didn't know better, listening to the opener "Elasticity" on the debut album by Royworld, Man in the Machine, you could think you were listening to a Roxy Music track circa 1973, both musically and vocally, with Rod Futrille doing a fair impression of Bryan Ferry without really trying. However, by track two it's obvious that their influences were much more recent, with the first hit single, "Dust," having a Coldplay-Keane style dominant piano. But to describe this album as a typical British indie pop recording would be to miss the variation of music as each track comes along, "Wish Ourselves Away" having the stop-start feel of Kate Bush's "Cloudbusting," Electric Light Orchestra's or even Laurie Anderson's mechanized vocals on "Astronaut," Thom Yorke's angst on the song "Brother," and even U2s guitar sound reproduced by Rob Parken on the track "Same Sun." Throwing all these influences into one pot is not a bad idea, somebody would be bound to like the album based on their own favorites, but on Man in the Machine, Royworld, perhaps tried too hard to please everybody and in the end, failed to satisfy with an album that has no real defining musical feel.