50 Foot Wave 50 Foot Wave

50 Foot Wave are another of those bands that have to deal with a horrendous weight of expectation on their shoulders. None of your lazy NME 'new saviours of rock' pronunciations mind: this expectation is entirely justified. Kristin Hersh is one of the big names in fem.alt.rock of the 80's and 90's. Throwing Muses were huge and undeniably influential, although none of the screechy girl-fronted bands that came in their wake ever quite captured the originality and front of the band, due in no small part to Hersh's feral vocals and finely-honed songwriting.

To be honest, it would be perfectly reasonable to expect her to have chilled a little. Motherhood, age, whatever, you could justify taking former bandmate Tanya Donelly's route into creating beautiful but very mellow songs. Big props then, as is the parlance of our times, for not giving up on the faithful - 50 Foot Wave is as raucous as anything the Muses came up with, and more so than most bands have managed this year.

At six songs, this mini was never going to outstay its welcome, but you'd still never expect the ferocity of opener Bug if you'd been lulled into an acoustic sense of security by Kristin's solo albums. A killer riff (surprisingly melodic given the overall noise quotient) sets the tone for the album, as each song has its share of angular, noisy rock. Hersh's embittered vocals shine on Clara's Bow, and catchy choruses abound on the same song.

If proof was needed that the elderly can still rock out, then this isn't it- Kristin's not that old, you know. As proof that you don't need to be a teenager to instil some bite in your alt.pop, though, 50 Foot Wave is pretty much perfect - in fact the wisdom of age adds a toughened edge of its own. Really though, age is irrelevant - this is quality rock and that's all that counts. Kristin Hersh is a genuine hero to a lot of people, and as such it's worth taking note of anything she comes out with. It makes it all the better when its blindingly ace like this.