Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Timing is only everything when serendipity deigns to lend a hand, the sense of fortune, the coincidence and the happy accident are all there to fulfil a schedule that even destiny would not turn its nose up at, that it would not sulk at the thought of entertaining; for such moments of meeting between a group of people is not to place your mind in a strunt; it is there to bring on joy and humour, to bring an end to the misery of thinking you are alone.

In act of beautiful self-effacement and humorous humility, David Fee and Les Oman tackle the observed ‘state of things’, the moment that brought them together, the head scratching of history’s apparent prank upon us all and the joke that politics bestows, one would hope is a hoax, but which sees ’45’s’ record as one of despair and futility.

Together as The Strunts, Les and David have found a common cause, one that sees the release of the album Too Much Of Everything consistently catching the ear and the appreciation of the listener, and whilst humour, even that born of desperate times, is enough to get you through adversity, you also need anger, the ability to wipe away fragments of reaction, and instead absorbing all the compassion, the sorrow and the remains of darkness and turning it on its head to thrust your own sword of humanity into the gut of those who do disservice to the population’s well-being.

Across tracks such as Everything On Gold, the superb Alien in Slovenia, Like Minds, Weaver’s Bay and the finale of The Geeks Shall Inherit The Earth, The Strunts, alongside collaborators and friends such as Alison Leith, Anne Leith, Mark Leishman, Alex Johnson, and with continuous presence of Sam Hales, bring an air of optimism and tight cynicism to the fore, and throughout Too Much Of Everything, the listener starts to understand that the only things you can have too much of are hate, apathy, ignorance and grief, that even in anger there must be subtle humour paving the way to the hope of healing fortune.

A tremendous introduction to a new partnership, caught at the right time and the right place, one that is unrepentant in the way their own strunt and pique of at the world of obstinate pettiness has brought them closer to creating joy.

Ian D. Hall