The Fins – And When You Get To The End (Album Review)

With over two hundred gigs and seven UK tours under their belts, The Fins are hardly taking baby steps on the music scene. However, the Farnborough based five-piece have lingered for more than three years on basement stages and carpeted practise rooms before deciding to release their first full-length LP. It may seem more like hesitation than anything else, but one thing is for certain: the maturity of their sound is undeniable throughout every bar of their debut release, ‘And When You Get To The End’.

Opening track ‘This Is Madness’ proves from the offset that the band are out to make a point. The song opens with subtle ghostly harmonics before giving way to genuine punk strokes, a lively bass riff and sharp, distorted guitar squeals. The song is powerful throughout, using looming distorted chords and driving drum-beats to goof effect.

The first three songs on the record work together as an impressive opening statement from the band. ‘Who Are You’ is a lively and ambitious track which fuses tribal chants and pounding jungle drums to form a sound with a definite power – it is certainly a track to look forward to hearing live.

This is followed directly by ‘Last Ninja’, which opens with restrained guitar tones in the mode of The Strokes, before unleashing a dirty guitar riff with enough distortion to make Matt Bellamy nervous. The track is exemplary of one of The Fins strongest features: the band are clearly well versed in the world of modern rock music, and throughout their debut release they offer several fleeting tributes to the bands which they clearly admire.

One such tribute can be found in ‘Try On My Eyes’: the song begins simply enough with intentionally off-time vocals and subtle percussive notes, before eventually giving way to a chorus which could be a direct homage to System Of A Down. The song is a grand affair, featuring time changes and intense build-ups which culminate in to form the most impressive track of the album.

Vocally, the album is a bit of a mixed bag. Ryan Adger‘s contributions begin as authoritative and occasionally insightful, drawing together the worlds of regret and bitterness into the occasional lyrical nugget. However, as the album progresses, Adger‘s efforts can sometimes become slightly jarring, especially in the moments when he lets his English tones leak out through the faux-American facade. However, that shouldn’t detract from the insights: in fact, it is during the last few tracks of ‘And When You Get To The End’, the album seems to find its feet lyrically.

‘No Joke’ comes across as a declaration of teenage nihilism, featuring shouts of “Give me a reason to believe” backed by sharp guitar riffs and enough punk angst to put Sum 41 to shame. Despite its strengths, the song opens with subtle acoustic strums, momentarily hinting at a potential for variety which the band unfortunately chose to ignore.

Penultimate song ‘Concrete Shoes’ is one of the strongest tracks on the album, mixing a lively punk feel with some interesting percussive turns. Lyrically Adger also dives into some genuine poetics for perhaps the first time on the album, declaring in heartfelt tones “Baby I’m your concrete shoes / and they will cling to you.”

Album rating - 7.5/10