One Night Only

The Helmsley band’s debut, Started a Fire, arrived in 2008. Just for Tonight and You and Me give the early music its most direct points of entry. The appeal comes from a young band making the arrangement feel expansive without losing the straightforward shape of the song. The keyboard and guitar parts provide different kinds of brightness around the vocal.

Touring gave that first record a practical life beyond the studio. The band’s own account of the period describes growing confidence alongside the pressures of being signed young. That combination becomes useful context for a second album interested in more than simply reproducing the first breakthrough.

One Night Only in 2010 was made with producer Ed Buller, whose earlier work included Suede and Pulp. Say You Don’t Want It places a sharper pop surface around a lyric questioning the images and promises surrounding success. The contrast is productive: the song can sound inviting while expressing discomfort with the world offering the invitation. The self-titled record gives electronic textures a more prominent place beside the band’s guitar playing, opening up another way to build a large chorus. Craig’s vocal remains an important anchor, but the arrangement supplies more of the movement and atmosphere. The two early albums document a particular change of scale, from local rehearsal-room ambition to a band deciding what kind of pop sound it could make after that ambition had begun to come true.