The Next: Good Shoes

I’m a terrible dancer. My brain and body operate on two different wavelengths, but as I get older, I’m growing less and less likely to give a fuck. If you get a few Jameson on the rocks in me, I’m ready to go. And you’d better be wearing a cup.

It must be a sight to behold, and not in a good way. So I have to apologize to my coworkers if they’ve seen me chair bopping like a demoniacally possessed weeble-wobble lately. Good Shoes latest album Think Before You Speak holds frightening power over my groove thang.

Hailing from the South East UK, Good Shoes is a four-piece that plays criminally addictive pop/new wave. The album is due out in the States on March 18th from Brille records. Here’s a little snippet from the press release:

Formed in 2005, the last two years have been an absolute whirlwind for the four twenty-something lads of Good Shoes – singer/guitarist Rhys Jones, guitarist Steve Leach, drummer Tom Jones and bassist Joel Cox. After releasing two limited edition singles which sold out in a matter of days, Good Shoes took to the road in the UK, amassing a rabid fanbase in the wake of their frenzied live shows. Soon after, they ran off to Sweden to record Think Before You Speak with Tore Johansson & Per Sunding (Franz Ferdinand, The Cardigans, New Order). The record was released in the UK to widespread critical acclaim, resulting in a No. 1 single on the UK Indie Chart and subsequent tours with the likes of Maximo Park, Kaiser Chiefs and more, in addition to festival appearances at Glastonbury and Reading and Leeds. Reveling in the work of their contemporaries instead of the punk legends of yore (aspects of the Good Shoes sound remind us of mid-’90s Pacific Northwest standouts) has given the band a distinctive magic and freshness that has clearly struck a chord with a legion of music lovers and Myspace addicts who turn up religiously at the band’s shows.

Words are at a loss to describe how fresh and fun this album sounds, so instead, he’s a picture taken from the group’s MySpace page from a Good Shoes live show.

Everyone seems to be having themselves a merry time. Too merry in the case of the dude in the middle of the second row. Check out a stream of Think Before You Speak here to hear what me, that dude and the rest of us are all so jacked up about.

Tags: good shoes, Indie, the next, UK