Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage “Bad Wiring”

We’d never heard of Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage so had presumed that they were a new band. But in fact Jeffrey Lewis has been performing for a considerable amount of time as a solo artist and as part of various bands.

As a result of ignorance, when we first heard opening song “Exactly What Nobody Wanted” our first reaction was wow this really sounds like Ezra Furman. That’s partly due to the similar vocals of Jeffrey and Ezra but also the way that songs like “Except For The Fact It Isn’t” and “Dog Of My Neighbourhood” walk a brilliant line between being great indie pop and more off the wall quirkiness.

The other thing that we loved about these songs is the great use of clever lyrics. There’s a great everyday commentary to tracks like “My Girlfriend Doesn’t Worry” and “Take It For Granted” which will inevitably have you smiling along to the songs. They grab your attention and are accompanied by great melodies. Indeed, the album hits a real high with the brilliant pop of “LP’s”. Although the smart indie rock of “In Certain Orders” runs it pretty close.

This is a brilliant indie pop album. It’s smart and funny but without being too clever for its own good. We were originally going to say that fans of Ezra Furman should definitely check this out, but maybe it should be our recommendation that fans of Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage should check out Mr Furman. Not that it really matters, because anyone who likes smart indie pop should definitely buy this.