• Band / Artist : The Legendary Hearts – mySpace
• Genre : Rock
• Sample Track Download : Falling Down
• Buy CD : N/A
• Free Digital Download : Band Site
• Rating : 9 out of 10

A slight departure from my normal reviews, as this is a band that has no EP, no album, and no recording contract. I’ve had them on my radar for a while and I was just looking at the stack of CDs still awaiting review, but something was calling me to finally do something with The Legendary Hearts and so here it is. They don’t have a work for me to release, but have 10 songs on their website, that I will review as if they are an album. I’ve called it quite aptly “N/A”.

For an unsigned band, they have an absolutely brilliant and very highly polished sound. It’s very distinctive and actually reminds me of another band reviewed recently, The Public Symphony, also hailing from London, UK. They have a very interesting combination of influences from the late Beatles, highly produced stuff, to the ambient, spaced out feel of Pink Floyd. There’s also a hint of the jangly guitar Byrds sound, making that a mix of 3 genres so far and it doesn’t stop there.

There are 10 tracks as I mentioned earlier available on their website and I recommend you go there A.S.A.P. to download them, as I’m sure once they’re signed, these will magically disappear. To actually download them all is a bit of a pain, so I’d love to see the band make them into a pseudo album that you can download as a whole, as they gel very effectively as a collective work.

“Love Don’t Get Me” has to be my favorite track on the “album”. It has all the markings of that super group ballad, that’s usually played towards the end of a concert, with people getting out their lighters to sway back and forth. Maybe that’s not an image the band wants to promote, but it’s an image that keeps surfacing to the top of my mind when I hear the song. “The Corporation” is also an interesting track with a great beat to it and an interesting use of what sounds like a BBC sound effects album, with some guy counting in that perfectly annunciating way that is synonymous with the BBC, quite appropriate considering the song title. I could also swear I hear a sound bite of Paul McCartney towards the end.

As I said before this band has been on my radar since February of this year. In that time they have revamped their website, which I hope is a sign of things to come. A talent this great deserves some recognition and with over 15,000 friends on their mySpace page, they at least have a strong public following, which I have no doubt would equate to some good record sales, once the band have something released.

Conclusion : I know I rant a lot about how many great bands there are out there, fighting to be heard, but this is defiantly a band worth investing some time into. I would love to hear them live and would especially like to see a few live downloads.