Dent May - The Sound Of My Summer

I'm frantically trying to clasp onto as much sunshine as possible, before the prevailing winter blues are set in. So my reminder of Summer is Dent May's "The Good Feeling of Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele".

OK so you've seen the Ukulele, but don't think George Formby or Israel Kamakawiwo. In fact remove this preconception from your mind altogether and flush it! Dent May's style has a distinctive 60's feel, which doesn't stop with the music. His physical appearance and video for "Howard" scream the vintage years.

Any given song off this album does tend to sound very much like the next, and the structure relies heavily on three chord tricks; but underneath this simplicity lies immense charm. The album is certainly a grower, you find you can't help yourself "shoebedoing" along to May's own brand of what he calls "healing, easy listening pop".

With reference to the music alone, the album is remains perky and uplifting throughout. Though the lyrics to tracks such as "College Town boy" have a cynical poignancy as if Morresey himself wrote them. So in that respect, like The Smiths albums the message is really bitter sweet.

If you had to make a comparison to any other band then think Beach Boys with a smallest hint of Jens Lekman, which incidentally seems a trend to another member of the Paw Tracks clan Panda Bear, who in the past has had a comparable element to the Beach Boys.