Hefner Breaking God's Heart

Hefner are one of my new indie favorites, from Essex, England. Sounding like a botched mixture of Pavement, Violent Femmes, Pulp, and Belle & Sebastian, their guitar pop rock sounds unique for some reason. You will either really enjoy singer Darren Hayman's wobbly voice, or you will hate it. I like it, I don't know if you can learn to like it or not though. But the songs are all diverse enough to keep us interested but similar enough to sound great together. Breaking God's Heart is their debut LP on Too Pure records, released July 1998. They have recently released a new record in Europe, The Fidelity Wars, but it is yet to see US release. Hopefully soon.

Highlights
Love Will Destroy Us in the End
A quick paced tune, the first single I believe. A great melody over some jangly-then-distorted guitars. Pop trio action taken to new heights! Hearing Hayman's teetering voice rhyme "you have a healing qualit-EE/that I s-EE" is always enjoyable.

The Librarian
Proves that a a trio of indie popsters can get do the ballads with an acordion and mandolin. Get down! A slow, love story type song, but it's lyrics of a poor man trying unsuccessfully to seduce his librarian never stop me from laughing. The comedy hides behind the heavy balladry, yes! Sample lyric: "the books he was to borrow he would surely never read/they had an intellectual caliber he hoped that she would see." Great tune.

Audio:
A Hymn for the Postal Service
A continuation of the catalog of Hefner songs titled "A Hymn for _______ (they've had the cigarettes/the alcohol/things we never did/Berlin and more). It's another one of their slower, ballad liek songs. I think they are stronger in their quicker, more upbeat songs, but the slow ones are great. Listen for the great lap steel guitars. And the great lyric "and I just can't convince her that I'm socialist." It's just the way he sings it and the way it fits, just listen, it's great.
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BUY! BUY! BUY!
It's their only album out in the states as yet, so if that is where you're from, it makes the decision an easy one. It's a great record, and CDNOW's always competitve prices will bring you to tears. And good luck finding this in your Best Buy or whatever, unless you have a really great record store nearby (like Luna Music for me) you won't be finding it anywhere close. So use the copper wires, thats what they are there for. Internet is the ANSWER. Buy it now.

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