Electric Child House // Goochie Goochie Goo EP - Review

"Goochie Goochie Goo" EP Artwork

Label White Rooms, a new Essex record label born out of popular studio space The White Room, must have been foaming at the mouth when they had this band put pen to paper and become the first release for them. Electric Child House are a proper grass roots rock band. They’ve created quite the local buzz over the past few years, with stunning live shows and faultless vocals and guitar. Whilst I had a guess they would bring the riffs on this debut, I did not know the "Goochie Goochie Goo" EP would come with a firm sense of variety, too. 

The first track and lead single, "Soul Sucker", was released in video form two weeks ago after a cheeky ‘translated’ subtitled video preview of the song and EP. The Led Zeppelin meets Rolling Stones guitar comes in, but with a modern twist. The lead vocals sound like Kasabian have *finally* had singing lessons and dropped the boozy pub vocal style. The refreshing reliability of pitch perfect, but still in a rock style, vocals allows the song to be a sum of all its parts rather than having anything particularly stick out. Drums are hit with all the right intensity, and the bass is melodic and smooth in the background of the mix. There is a short solo, as not to distract from the focus of the chorus – a brilliant, catchy anthem with the tracks’ name in the lyrics. What song would not be complete without a bit of harmonica either?

Just when you think Essex has the next straight up rock band ready to launch into the world, "False Widow" shimmers in. The drums start this song, with an interesting beat before bass takes the lead. The vocals? Linkin Park-esque on this. A huge show of variety, with different volumes to almost every instrument on show. This could easily fill academies up and down the country, albeit a bit slow perhaps for a single. It doesn't stay that way, with the final third starting with a fantastic riff – repeated right at the end - to inject some needed pace into the song.

The next song is no different – another show of variety. This time, "Plastic Rebellion" starts with only acoustic guitar, before vocals come in, in a style that I am sure Noel Gallagher would be more than happy to wield his seal of approval on. Once the full band comes in, it is clear to see this is building up to a faster song. A change in the drums and electric guitar signal more prominent bass. Whilst this is probably the weakest track on the EP for me, this is not to say it is a bad song – in fact, far from it. This band have just tracklisted two reasonably slow song after a rock driven lead single. For a new band, they have balls, and justify that potential risk with another perfectly executed solo in the build up to the end of the song.

After the short title track, an intriguing tribal interlude sound, comes the final track. "Juice" does just that, adding a bit more juice to the album. This sounds like the brother of "Soul Sucker", creating a rounded feel to the EP, and a cohesion to the album and the band's sound. Without this, the band would be perhaps left in a crisis of identity, and could easily be criticised for not settling on one sound, so deciding to preview all of their possible styles. But they have not. This final track continues the rock guitar found on "Soul Sucker", and provides a pleasing ending to the EP.

Whilst "Soul Sucker" is easily my favourite form the first offering on the label, this is a very solid EP for a band and new record label to start off with. Thoroughly recommended.


7/10

Electric Child House will be headlining The Sebright Arms in Bethnal Green on Thursday the 18th June for their EP release party. Tickets are available to buy from www.labelwhiteroom.com