The Bees (A Band Of Bees) - Sunshine Hit Me

This album was listed in my queue as being by The Bees, but the album I downloaded through Murfie identifies them as A Band Of Bees. Supposedly the former is their real name and the latter is their American name. I hope that doesn't mean the albums are different in some way. The cover art is the same, hopefully the track listing and mixes are the same too.

"Punchbag" opens with a jazzy organ solo before giving way to cool 70s pop style horns. It's like funk-lite and is a smooth lead-in. "Angryman" is even funkier, though the vocals feel a little too forced to reach the higher register. "No Trophy" has a more natural vocal feeling, and also features an island-music influence. I'm not a fan, but The Bees are changing things up, which is worth a few points in my book. "Sunshine" almost completely dispenses with vocals. The Bees play an excellent smooth jazz instrumental.

"A Minha Menina" is another welcome change. It's a pretty solid rocker played mostly on acoustic guitar with electric overdubs. "This Town" slows things down for a groove. "Sweet Like A Champion" beings with a lovely clear piano concerto which I was hoping would hold throughout the song. Instead once the rest of the band joins in the recording becomes scratchier. It's a shame, because it's more cliched to mix a song this way to make it sound haunting and dark. Since the piano opening was so crystal clear it's suddenly striking now how all the songs have that light scratchy sound over top. It's particularly heavy on the drums. I'm also noticing on the later tracks that the piano they are mainly using is slightly out-of-tune. It only really becomes an issue during "Zia" where the piano plays an identical part to the horns. A piano out-of-tune with itself can have a pleasing honky-tonk or old-timey feel. An out-of-tune piano playing a duet with a properly tuned trumpet sounds sloppy.

I consider those pretty minor complaints. I really like how this album plays around with multiple styles and moods, unlike most albums I've been hearing lately that only know how to do one sound or one type of song. This is largely a mellow and pleasant album, and it seems like The Bees might be an interesting group to check out on a long-term basis. I'm quite happy to say I really liked this album. 4 stars.