‘One Day This Will All Be Fields’ sees Oxygen Thief come full-circle in his own musical journey – albeit temporarily. Having started as a solo project, Barry Dolan expanded his vision to a full band aping The Future of the Left, Reuben and other British alt-rock/post-hardcore bands of that ilk. But for ‘One Day…’ he has reverted to his initial one man, one guitar ethos. Just as the EP falls between albums, it also falls between two stalls musically. What we have here is the kind of riffing and song-writing Jamie Lenman and co. would be proud of, only played with a ragged campfire punk-rock spirit.
Unfortunately, this dissonance between approach and medium is largely jarring and unsatisfying. The nagging thought that these tracks would work much better fully-fleshed out, performed by a full band is inescapable. There is, however, a lot for which Dolan should be commended. The clash of styles immediately sticks out as an unpolished, quirky trait of Dolan’s work. His tracks develop in ways that are initially difficult to predict, but eventually feel natural enough. ‘Badge of Dishonour’, for example, climaxes with a foreboding repetition of the EP’s title after a knotty progression and is probably the best realisation of Dolan’s vision here. Dolan navigates potentially convoluted structures with exemplary guitar-work: short, jagged phrases jump out of the mix to punctuate his complicated riffs. The way the guitar in ‘Self-Righting Mechanism’ and ‘Trial Improvement’ coils and uncoils is engaging, but would benefit from greater dynamics. He also displays an inconsistent penchant for provocative, even insightful lyrics comprised of wordy social diatribes and dry one-liners.
Still, the five tracks on show here ultimately sound more like faintly promising demos than finished pieces. The effectiveness of these tracks is sapped by their narrow textural and dynamic range. This self-imposed impotency is present across the album. At times, Dolan shows he has the ability to be a rabble-rousing social commentator, but too often he resorts to verbose, overly thorny language. A scarcity of memorable moments also means these tracks tend to meander. As a result, the EP is frustratingly insufficient. Having said that, were these tracks to be expanded upon and refined by a full band, they could be great…
RICHARD CRAIG