Smith & Burrows- Funny Looking Angels

December is upon us and the Christmas festivities are beginning to take shape. The bells are starting to ring, the presents are swiftly being bought and most importantly for writers like myself, the arrival of new Christmas albums to the charts and shop shelves has commenced. Smith & Burrows, consisting of Tom Smith of The Editors and former drummer of Razorlight, Andy Burrows, have offered music listeners a new festive album for Christmas 2011, whilst leaving out the pandemic, commercialism that has scorned (and celebrated) Christmas classics of the past.

The album consists of a number of newly constructed wintery tracks that highlight the time of year’s traditional climate, with also adding a dimension of political issues that have plagued  the world in recent months, most notably seen in the track, When The Thames Froze. A number of Christmas covers also feature on the album, from Yazoo’s Only You to Mel Torme’s The Christmas Song. Smith & Burrows cleverly add a seasoned glisten to these new renditions of old tracks, making the tracks more appealing to the contemporary age, though highlighting the time of year. This new version of Only You is particularly impressive.

Not only do the covers have a traditional veneer smothered over them, but even the newly recorded tracks hold an anthemic, aura-filled drone that is consistent amidst the album. This is owed a lot to Smith’s vocals that appear to really suit this music genre. Smith’s vocals help many tracks convey a homely atmosphere amongst the orchestral instrumentation, as seen particularly with In The Bleak Midwinter and The Christmas Song. With a good array of instrumentation, the piano, strings and bells add to the albums authenticity as a true Christmas composition.

To summarise, the duo of Smith & Burrows have successfully created a well-rounded Christmas album that succeeds in not getting on your nerves after being played on repeat, something hard to come by if you think about many Christmas albums of the past…sorry Sir Cliff. Funny Looking Angels shares a new breed of Christmas album that acts as more of a seasonal release. However, its status as a Christmas album limits its success to the holiday season, and with no previous work to their name, Smith & Burrows may just slip under the radar on many music listeners radar this December. Nevertheless, the album contains many positive elements and gains bonus points for not promoting the festive commercialism that surrounds Christmas, like many albums before have been known to do.

8.5/10