Love screws you over in many ways. It makes you selfish, giving you, as British poet Philip Larkin muses, “the blind persistence/To upset an existence/Just for your own sake.” You don’t fare any better when you’re unselfish; Larkin goes on to ask, “How can you be satisfied/Putting someone else first/So that you come off worst?”
Love and its multifaceted complications are at the centre of The Magic Numbers’ self-titled debut album. The British band, consisting of brother/sister pairs Sean and Angela Gannon and Michele and Romeo Stodart, perform songs about falling in love, falling out of love and all the crap in between.
The album is a refreshing take on heartache as musical theme. There are no angst-ridden diatribes à la Alanis Morrisette, no power ballads usually associated with hair bands and no sweet melodies reminiscent of Feist–with the exception of the catchy track “Love’s A Game.” The majority of the songs are upbeat, nicely blending 60s pop, folk and indie rock. The lyrics don’t have much substance to them, but The Magic Numbers put out a fun record nonetheless, even when the subject matter concerns the difficulties of love.