- Brisbane’s The Jungle Giants are probably one of the last bastions of the summery-indie-pop sound that absolutely dominated the local scene in recent times. Having ridden out the success of their catchy debut, the band have returned to navigate the oh-so-tricky waters of the sophomore album, with their new record, Speakerzoid. For the most part they emerge from this challenge unscathed, triumphant even, having produced a solid album that both builds on their debut, and makes some attempt at boundary pushing and musical development. At their core, The Jungle Giants are still just an indie rock/pop band, but with Speakerzoid there’s a real sense that the band have made a conscious decision to not be quite so easily tied to the stereotypes of the genre. Instead of settling into a sound, the band have played up the eccentricities that made them interesting in the first place. The whole thing is actually a little all over the place, but there’s something quite genuine about what The Jungle Giants have tried to do here.

The record opens with the first single, Every Kind Of Way. The track isn’t particularly representative of the entire album, with its spoken word lyrics punctuated by an occasional screeching noise, it’s almost jarring at first, but soon grows on you after a second listen. Devil’s Play brings some funk into the mix, like many of the other tracks it’s led by a strong bass line. Kooky Eyes falls a little flat, at times going big where you feel like there should have been restraint and later, doing the opposite.

Lemon Myrtle exists somewhere in the space between guitar pop and synthy electro, but in the confusion it loses some of the momentum stronger earlier tracks had created. Thankfully the psychedelic, summery guitar tones of What Do You Think? get everything back on track before the slightly odd, ninety second Mexico pushes off to yet another frontier in this endlessly expanding genre-boundary-breaking, thanks to the rather eccentric addition of a flute. Not Bad is more minimalist, with a splash of vocals over a beat featuring a whole lot of cowbell. We Can Work Together again leans heavily on the drums and bass for direction, while the almost six-minute finale of Tambourine unfortunately has very little direction at all.

Speakerzoid is a little uneven at times, but there’s something about The Jungle Giants that somehow manage to make all the experimentation and eccentricities feel incredibly genuine. They’ve come a long way since their debut EP, and in this relatively short forty minute album, have managed to show that they really do have potential, not to mention some serious song-writing chops. Only time will tell if they manage to carry their audience with them on this journey of musical self-discovery, but for now -at the very least- they’re one of the few producing pop worth listening to right now.

- Clare Armstrong.