Review: Sketchshow – WAVES

Style: math rock (clean vocals)
Review by: Nick
Country: United Kingdom
Release date: 7 May, 2021

One of the greatest joys in life, I firmly believe, is math rock. It takes pop punk/emo, indie rock, jazz fusion, and puts it in a massive genre-blender to produce one of the most vibing genres out there today. And it has variety too! Tera Melos leans heavier on the jazz fusion side of things while TTNG leans heavily on indie and American Football famously leans hard into emo. When you take a little bit of each part, however, you may end up with a band like Sketchshow.

The Southampton based five piece released their first full length which is acting as a follow up to their 2018 EP Patchwork. While a math rock album at heart filled with flashy riffs on clean guitars layered over complex drum parts, it’s also comprised bits and pieces from various other genres. Take my favorite track, “Delight” for example. This song starts with a certain kind of funkiness on top of some more reserved, dance-beat style drums. Later in the album you have a song like “Empty Without You” that feels like a kind of pop punk/emo Bent Knee. Then there’s a moment in “Smoke” where they go into a djent-type breakdown for a second while still using clean guitars. It’s this variety that makes this band fit into the literal definition of progressive. They’re taking some pre-established sounds and making something entirely unique.

Aside from the variety of inspirations, the other biggest thing this album has going for it would be (in my opinion) Satin Bailey‘s vocals. She has some of the most creative vocal melodies I’ve heard in a hot minute which is refreshing for a genre that has always trended towards emo sad boi vocals. Her vocal expressions on top of the constantly moving melodies makes for some really cool moments. My favorite may be towards the end of “Delight” where she sings the chorus in a way that sounds almost like it’s mimicking dance music sampling (which compliments the dancey drums that I mentioned before). It’s this experimenting that keeps her melodies from feeling less like they’re there out of obligation and more like they’re a centerpiece.

The only issue I have with this album is the lack of any real presence from the bass. I’m unsure if it’s because they were seemingly in between bass players for a lot of this album (the guitarists actually play bass for four out of ten tracks), but it seems to be that way because most of the time the bass is either playing root notes or doubling the guitar line which is very different from how it was on their EP. Maybe it’s because I’m a bass player so it sticks out to me more, but the lack of personality in that low end leads to it feeling like there’s a missing piece of the puzzle.

Bass issues aside, this is a really solid first full length. It falls just a bit shy of groundbreaking in my eyes, but this band’s potential is absolutely off the charts. With math rock you have hundreds of bands to get your fill from, but Sketchshow has managed to bring a sound to the table that you can’t really get elsewhere. The closest bands would probably be CHON, Thank You Scientist, or Bent Knee, but even they all lack the specific aspects that make Sketchshow unique. They may not have their sound perfected quite yet, but if this is how they are right now, I can’t wait to hear what they sound like next.

Recommended tracks: Delight, Empty Without You, Good News
Recommended for fans of: Covet, Bent Knee, Thank You Scientist, CHON
Final verdict: 8/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram

Label: Independent

Sketchshow is:
– Satin Bailey (vocals)
– Adam Curran (guitar, backing vocals, bass on track 5)
– Luke Phillips (guitar, backing vocals, keys, bass on tracks 8, 9, & 10)
– Will Sales (bass)
– Scott van der Leeden (drums, percussion, backing vocals)