Album Review: The Preatures - Blue Planet Eyes

Sydney band The Preatures’ greatest strength is also their weakness: they’re really good at writing songs that sound like Is This How You Feel?.

Their debut album is as slick as a pair of tight leather pants, but that’s not to say these tracks haven’t had their fair share of reverb spilt on them at bars. Blue Planet Eyes simultaneously drips with equal portions of rock’n’roll detachment and dark desire.

Released just after Haim’s single, Falling, started to pick up traction, Is This How You Feel? revels in the retro renaissance that fuelled much of last year’s pop music. Similar styles soak through most of this album, as Somebody’s Talking skips to the church on time and Better Than It Ever Could Be struts in a New York groove. Throughout all this, lead singer Isabella Manfredi’s voice channels the sultriness and mystery of Kim Carnes’ Bette Davis Eyes.

There’s not much beyond this sunglasses-at-night vibe on Blue Planet Eyes. Manfredi’s songwriting is strictly pop, and she’s said that she wants to make people “feel the most in the least amount of time.” The closing track, Business, Yeah, is the most reflective writing on the album. Two Tone Melody is the only other moment that comes to any kind of clear-eyed sentiment, and even then it’s shrouded behind a hazy mist of production from guitarist and co-producer Jack Moffitt. Blue Planet Eyes waltzes through the haze and on to the scene like it’s been here all along.