Temper Trap go down the Rabbit Hole

Here's one song that made my ears prick up on holiday last week - the latest offering from The Temper Trap. Admittedly, my ears pricked up because I thought I was hearing a newly-unearthed outtake from The Bends-era Radiohead, but then I recognised Dougie Mandagi's distinctive Aussie twang in the vocals and my ears pricked down again. That said: Rabbit Hole is still a pretty awesome track.

Fans should be familiar with the song already, as the band have been playing it live for the last couple of years. Like all the best songs ever written, it starts off very quietly and then suddenly goes mental around the half-way mark with a honking great guitar solo. Honking great guitar solos are always a good thing, "btw". Yes, even when they're done by Brian May and appear on a single by Dappy. I don't make the rules.

The Temper Trap - Rabbit Hole


As is the way these days, Rabbit Hole is not a single. It's a flag in the ground. Because rather than blow you away with the most amazing "cut" from their new album, the band would rather have you go, "oh hey, isn't that the group who did the song on the Match Of The Day montage two years ago? I'd kind of forgotten about them. Do they have a new album or something?". Then later, when you're least expecting it, they're going to come back WHAM! with a fucking amazing single that will make you wonder why they bothered with this one at all.

At least I think that's the idea. I don't quite get it. It's like chatting someone up by boasting about the swimming proficiency badge you got at school and then, two months later, saying: "By the way did I mention how I'm a multi-millionaire astronaut and underneath this mask I look like George Clooney?"

The band's album, by the way, will be called Temper Trap - which either means its a career-defining body of work, or that the original title "Benedict Cumberbatch's Soggy Vegetable Patch Irrigation Disaster" got vetoed at the last minute by the lawyers.

Damn lawyers.

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