Smiles And Bigger Hearts
Burning Bungalow, 2020
9/10
Listen to Smiles And Bigger Hearts
Originally a solo project for Andrea Nocco’s guitar songs, these days Beingmoved are an Italian rock quartet, where his brother Edoardo contributes guitar and backing vocals, while Samuele Puppo handles bass and backing vocals and Simone Brunzu takes up drums. Though this first album was started pre-Covid, it was finished up during lockdown as Andrea tracked the vocals last on a fantastic debut that’s equal parts punk, alt-rock, indie and even Britpop.
“My House” starts the listen on a very high note as guitar driven indie-rock meets ‘90s alt-rock with plenty of gritty melody amid a sing-along quality, and “Young” follows with a rugged, angular approach that’s both raw and polished and just begs to be played along with an old Dinosaur Jr. record.
There’s 9 tunes here, and each one is gem, including the harmonic vocals of the pop influenced “I Could”, as well as the instantly contagious “Over!”, where the dynamic rhythm section highlights the soaring melodies perfectly.
Near the end, “Drops, Stars, Givin’ Up” offers a chunkier aspect to the band’s meticulous song craft with some warm ambience, and “Here’s All” finishes off the album with firm nods to the early days of college rock but that sounds just as good today as it did in the early ‘90s.
An album that gets better with each listen, Beingmoved have positioned themselves rather quickly to the very top of the list of current bands playing alt-rock with this incredible effort.
Travels well with: Pyjamarama- Simple Living; Mount Sharp- That Shadow