Album Review: Terra Terra Terra - Mind Like A Man, Soul Like A Child

Terra Terra Terra hail from Lakeland, FL and have been working the Central Florida music scene for two years now. Only recently signed to Round Kid Records, this is Terra Terra Terra’s second full length album and one which they hope will catapult out of the Florida marshes and into the mainstream alternative scene.

Now first of all, don’t let their terrible name put you off…I wonder if this is something that the band should address!?

Ambient emotional indie is a term I’ve not heard before, but I’m going to use that as the best way I can think of to describe this band. The album starts with a weird fuzzy spoken word piece over a distant piano before launching into ‘Paradigm’ with it’s almost Muse’esque intro with a poppy feel to it, the track leaves you wondering what direction this band are going to go in.

Next track ‘Transmission Lost’ ups the tempo and is a much louder, faster affair this is the leading single from the album and its obvious why. The tracks leads me to believe this is going to be an album full of synth driven commercial pop punk like every other band coming out of the States right now. The track is good and a sure fire hit with the kids. Get this on MTV2 and they will be flocking in their thousands to get hold of this album…the problem is have they been mislead?

‘Too Far’ is quite a forgettable affair before ‘Taking Her Home’ grabs my attention with some strong emotional vocals and some nice guitar work throughout.

From now on things with this album start to change, with the odd exception, the pace of the album on the whole seems to get slower and slower! You won’t find any more pop punk but don’t let that put you off, this band has much more to offer…

‘Only The Penitent Man Shall Pass’ finally sees singer Loren start to show the vocal range which up until now he’d shown glimpses of but to me always seemed to be holding back! He really lets loose on this fantastically eerie tune. The song has a great mellow drum beat surrounded by whirling effects and haunting vocals that really stand out. Terra Terra Terra really up their game on this track in my opinion and it really makes the hairs on your neck stand on end!

This leads straight into the equally haunting ‘This Is My Associate Cornelius’. Beautiful vocals throughout, it reminds me a little of a darker Straylight Run…if ‘Transmission Lost’ is going to be the anthem to your summer, this will be the soundtrack to those dark cold winter nights…brilliant!

The album then drifts away with a couple of ‘take it or leave it’ tracks which is a shame but I think this band has shown enough quality to keep me interested.

I like this album a lot, it hasn’t blown me away and there is definitely a handful of tracks that will get the boot from my iphone but on the whole it is a pretty good listen. I would highly recommend this band if you enjoy slow burning emotional indie. This is your chance to be the first to tell all your friends and champion this band before they blow up big!

3.5/5

Mind Like A Man, Soul Like A Child by Terra Terra Terra is available now on Round Kid Records


Terra Terra Terra on MySpace

Check out leading single ‘Transmission Lost’ here.

Matt Buck