NME, 6 February 2008


Built around cartoon Sabbath/Supergrass style riffs and lots of group falsetto hooks, the songs are custom designed to burrow into your brain within seconds.

Right, so the singer and guitarist, Sammy, is sporting these silly blue jeans that are covered in gold swirls; the drummer, Matt, looks about half his bandmates' age, while the bassist, Jonny, is wearing a waistcoat emblazoned with big green letters that say 'JONNY TOKYO' (all three of 'em go by the last name of 'Tokyo', you see). The songs, meanwhile, are called things like 'Return of the Rockstars' (which, as far as What Would Jesus Drive are concerned, is them) or 'TV Evangelist' (which goes "You're just a... you're just a... you're just a... TV superstar") and are all frenetically paced, built around cartoon Sabbath/Supergrass style riffs and lots of group falsetto hooks that are custom designed to burrow into your brain within seconds. None of them last more than three-and-a-half minutes. Midway through 'Throw Your Hands Up' the audience are encouraged to... oh, you get the idea: What Would Jesus Drive wear stupid clothes, have stupid hair and make stupid music for people who wanna get stupic for a bit. There's a good chance they'll be utterly unavoidable in 2008.

Hamish MacBain, www.nme.com