Unpeeled

We like this band and we like the latest offerings from their messily productive rock-pop palette. "Black Water" being a weirdly compelling thing that combines a shambolic Beck with a hybrid Ray Davies and Steve Marriot to batter an altogether too together Blur into a Camden collapse, but… "Every Time I Hear Your Name" is the killer, it shimmers, strolls, spangles and glides so effortlessly into it’s graceful balladeering style, "I got my pound of flesh" indeed. The Customers are genuinely excellent and I can think of a dozen 'name' and a gross of 'buzz' bands who might be slaughtered at their feet to clear a way for this lovely stuff.

New Noise

I'm instantly enjoying this as it has a drummer who isn't in the midst of some kind of steroid rage. But hold on! The rest of the band hold up as well. Tuneful and pacey with a winning energy. Really nice. Think this lot could get really interesting in a few singles' time. I'd like to see more of this lot. Go buy this please, people.

Sounds XP

It takes a few listens to weave its spell but there comes a moment when the opening riff becomes lodged on your internal jukebox and won't turn off. A band from South Devon via Brighton, and released on Neil Halstead’s new label, they remind you what 'proper' songwriting is: not the soporific pap of Keane or Thirteenth Senses but the more crafted, complex, intriguing variety (Radiohead meets Leonard Cohen, say). With its odd time signature and off beat lyrics about good things going bad, 'Black Water' is a bit of an original.

The other track 'Every Time I Hear Your Name' is slower, slicker and more sensual, sounding like the Go Betweens or a more sedate Suede. Ostensibly a love song with an optimistic beginning and unhappy ending ("every time I hear your name I bleed"), you raise an eyebrow at some of the ambiguous lyrics when you realise what "it" refers to: "we were going to have it like sister and brother". Ugh!

The Leeds Guide

Hot on the heels of Editors, Brighton-based five-piece The Customers have got that Snow Patrol-covering-The Pixies sound off pat, and they’re big-hearted enough to feed it to us on a double A-side.

If the sonic indications of 'Black Water'/'Every Time I Hear Your Name' (released on Shady Lane Records) are to be believed, by rights this band shouldn’t be from South Devon. They should be fending off noise complaints from sets of be-kilted neighbours across the loch.

Kicking in with tick-tocking keyboard pips that become drowned out by a decisive, tuneful vocal and a gratifyingly driving bass-line, 'Black Water' escalates into crashing waves of squealing electronics and loopy feedback that are expertly kept in step by short, sharp riffs.

If ‘Every Time I Hear Your Name’ sounds like the title of your usual heartstring-yanking that’s because it is; Mogwai-esque guitars come across like a de-tuned string section and the melody sounds like it’s been penned just to be howled drunkenly up at slammed windows. There's no beating around the bush with this lot though, with the opening line "It was certain from the very first time that we met / That we were going to have it away with each other" candidly laying to rest any faux-romantic notions that getting into her pants isn’t the first thing on their mind.

Picadilly Records

Debut single release from Brighton based band The Customers. They have been carving out a loyal following and have recently started their own club night in Brighton which has been a resounding success. Having played with the likes of British Sea Power and Eighties Matchbox - The Customers are set to strike out on their own. This is the first in a series of very limited 7" singles to be released over the next few months.