Love It When You Hate Me is the latest single from young Auckland singer Max Earnshaw, who has already received from recognition and radio airplay for his last release, Lonely Love. What we have this time around is a pop/rock number which is incredibly infectious and annoyingly catchy. Although it was recorded with a full band, the way it has been produced is that it is quite possible to imagine that this was recorded just by Max in the studio, with the drums in particular sounding quite programmed. But somehow it all gels together and one wonders what this is like when he plays it live as I can imagine this having a far greater emphasis on the rock, and less on the pop.
It is a summer single which is fresh and exciting, with his vocals well to the fore, in an early 80’s indie style which is quite reminiscent at times of Blur. There is both picked and jangly guitar, a strong bass, and while I would have preferred for the instrumentation to be richer and more rounded, the fairly flat style does work well in this context. It is only just over three minutes long, but there is a feeling that it has been stretched to reach that length with vocal repetitions, but I can pretty much guarantee I am not the target market and I can imagine this going over very well indeed with a young audience. One to keep an ear out for.
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About the author Kev Rowland
From 1990 – 2006 I ran Feedback fanzine in the UK, writing about bands that were rarely covered in the mainstream press, many of whom were in the underground scene. I built close ties with many British Progressive groups in particular, including writing the newsletter for Freewill, getting gigs for Credo and writing the introduction to Galahad’s OCMDII compilation. I reviewed literally thousands of cassettes and then CDs from bands from throughout the world, and was lucky enough to interview many of them. During this period I also contributed to the French progzine Acid Dragon, wrote for the music newspaper Rock ‘n’ Reel and was also involved with the Ghostland website. In 2006 I moved to NZ, and stopped running Feedback (which was then renamed Amplified after I left, at my request) having produced over 80 editions with more than 11,000 pages of print and heaven knows how many reviews
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