Reviews

It isn’t that the amplification is needed to plaster over the cracks, as is often the case with rock, but more that with louder you push their tunes, the more that they reveal the subtleties, nuances and tiny details that make them special.

As intelligent and epic as it inviting and enjoyable, 'Send Me Your Champion' shows off just how strong a band Grand Volume are and how important they could be, as they combine their influences effectively to produce something fundamentally pulsating.

Grand Volume - Send Me Your Champion

Every band’s debut has the imprint of the artists that made them want to thrash guitars in the first place and Grand Volume’s is no different. Across the 13 tracks, there are nods to the heyday of grunge, snippets of Radiohead and Muse, freewheeling snatches of The Mars Volta and Mogwai, and even the occasional injection of emo and daub of goth.

In the hands of a lesser band, it could have been an unholy mess. The fact that it isn’t tells you everything you need to know about Grand Volume.

Indeed, it is that range of influences that makes the resulting collection so good, as the band show they are as happy to produce a three minute assault as they are to pummel the senses for a good eight minutes.

Taut brevities like 'Broken' and the chaotically thrilling 'Do You Hunger?' slide in gritty punches between the expansive epics of 'Did You See Us?', 'Here We Are' and the utterly exhausting and exhilarating 'Departure Lounge'.

'Send Me Your Champion' might just be the best debut album to exit this city all year. File it next to Oceansize's 'Effloresce' and Amplifier’s eponymous debut and rejoice that once again, a Mancunian band has proved that there’s so much more to this city’s guitar music than swaggering walks, just-out-of-bed haircuts and dull copycat tunes.