Grouplove is a lot about harmonies, hand-clapping and blasting vocals escaping the song like a free bird, whilst the energy and the jumping around on stage are constant. With Pixies-esque rhythms, they are nevertheless quite hard to categorize, and if there was a genre called mood-boosting they would completely fit in this category.
They have hooks, plenty of them, and they keep you interested right away even if you have never heard any of their songs, you just have to listen to ‘Naked Kids’, or ‘Colours’, of their self-titled released EP to understand.
Singers Christian Zucconi and Hannah Hooper (although the other members provide plenty of interesting back-up vocals too) combine their voices with a rare conviction, Zucconi’s delivery being strong, sharp and in your face, and Hooper’s wooo-oos vocals being more delicate, both making their screaming chanting duets swell like summer anthems over the rest of the music.
I have read a few negative reviews about them from people certainly more than annoyed by the hype surrounding the LA quintet; that’s true there is some media frenzy around them, especially since they have opened for Florence and the Machine in November.
I know that their name sounds a little cheesy, just like their story: Hannah and Christian fell in love in Manhattan, they went to the island of Crete where they met the rest of the band, Londonian guitarist Sean Gadd, guitarist and pro surfer Andrew Wessen, and drummer Ryan Rabin (he is the son of Yes guitarist Trevor Rabin), and all moved to LA to make music together….
But there would absolutely be no reason to spoil the good humor, the enthusiasm, the…er… love of a very satisfied young audience, braving a LA cold evening to find the joy and the fun of a sunny harmony fest.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCDsGfZVIl4&fs=1&hl=en_US]