In an ideal world, Charlie Boyer & The Voyeurs would exist in that monochrome early 1970s New York landscape of Television, CBGBs and hardchaws on the Bowery. But that was then and this is now, so the Londoners' chief concern is to ensure a rugged, ragged kind of authenticity and individuality rather than a pasted-on pastiche of Tom Verlaine's greatest riffs. Edwyn Collins and Seb Lewsley's production helps hugely in this regard, turning the band's sharp guitars and swirling organs this way and that in pursuit of something more than the Blank Generation. In their best songs the band sidestep the obvious and find new thrills in the kinks, especially on the expertly constructed Go Blow a Gale, the magnificent thump and bang of I Watch You, and the sublime organ-led rumpus of Be Glamorous.
charlieboyerandthevoyeurs@bandcamp.com
Download: I Watch You, Be Glamorous