The Sea Navy

The Sea Navy is a new project with Jay Cox (The Ivory Coast) on vocals and guitar, Stuart Fletcher (The Sorts, Sea Tiger) on bass, and TW Walsh (Pedro the Lion, Headphones, The Soft Drugs) producing (and helping out with bass, for a while). Arctic Advice is their headlining song on Myspace for a reason; the initial guitarwork is sharp and ear-catching. Which seems a common theme, actually; their songs always start off with notably dapper instrumentals, but by the end, the momentum of cool seems gone or tarnished.

Jay's vocals remind me a bit of Conor Oberst when he's feeling adequately medicated, and a bit of Colin Meloy, and a bit of one of the Nada Surf vocalists--I think it's Matthew Caws. I need a name for this infusion of the London retro/mod sound; it seems to be big for up-and-coming bands. It rarely makes for distinctive music, though, unless done devastatingly well; there's so much of it that it doesn't make much of an impression. Unfortunately, in this case I think the music is much the same as the name: initially promising, but redundant on further exposure.

Stream their Myspace-available music (M3U)

tags: [Music], [mp3], [Sea Navy]