The curse of the great single: for the band it leaves the album with a lot to live up to; for the listener it leads to the expectation that it will do just that.
In 'The Young Folks' Swedish outfit Peter, Bjorn and John have a song that could put Snow Patrol's 'Most Used Music on Sports Programmes' title in jeopardy.
To their credit, the trio actually do manage to equal its brilliance with the anthemic 'Objects of My Affection'. The problem is that both those songs come in the first eight minutes of the album and, while never living up to its name, 'Writer's Block' doesn't come close to those heights again.
It's cool and listenable but there's a feeling of indie-by-numbers about the likes of 'Amsterdam' and 'Up Against the Wall'.
The solution could have been to use 'The Young Folks'' guest vocalist Victoria Bergsman of The Concretes shine on a few more songs and let more sparks fly.
With two albums already released, 'Writer's Block' is a solid calling card from Peter, Bjorn and John to the rest of the world. It will be remembered mostly for one track in these mp3 times, however, and that might not be enough to make someone seek out the back catalogue.
Harry Guerin
