Pan Am: New Concepts In Sound Recording

By RUSSELL BAILLIE

(Herald rating: * * * * )

The six-track debut EP from this Auckland trio shows them to be fine exponents of scruffy, good-humoured, energised pop-rock with songs that suggest everything from a tatty Union Jack as backdrop (the Who-ish opener, Long Grass) to echoes of the Nirvana era laced with a harmony-laden pop goofiness (Use Someone, Tangelo Tree). And they do a good sideline in fuse-blown electropop (Song 1) and reminders of their strum-happy, 80s Nun forebears (What You Want), too.

Closing track Saskatchewan isn't the Superette song of the same name that they covered for the label's 21st birthday album, but it's nice to see that a largely empty bit of Canada continues to provide so much inspiration so far away.

Expect Pan Am's economy-class guitar pop to provide many future happy landings.

Label: Flying Nun