MAMMALS - ANIMALIA

Mammals:
Animalia:
Gondwana:
CD:
Out Sep 15th:

★★★★★★☆☆☆☆

Sydney-based calm-popsters Mammals follow up their support slot with The 1975 with a pleasant 5-track EP due out in the autumn.

Fans of later-era Foals, Bombay Bicycle Club, the aforementioned The 1975 and that ilk will warm to the band's resonating tones and blissed-out beats of this mostly melancholic but occasionally sprightly EP, although there's little to determine Mammals from anything else I hear on 6 Music.

Circles and Codeine Eyes are hopeful attempts at wide-eyed harmonious white-collar anthem-pop, the type of thing Daughter brought to the table a few years ago, while Depraved is a brooding slice of electronica that buzzes promisingly before stop-starting its way to a somewhat predictable if positive conclusion.

Layered vocals and smoothed guitar passages permeate the rest of the EP in varying emotional amounts, all of which must signal a forthcoming full-length album.