Every month TG rates the latest recordings by NUMU students. NUMU is a site for young people to showcase their music, meet others and learn new skills. Check it out!

TRACK OF THE MONTH

'I Miss Your Smile' - The Cex

This is a seriously catchy tune built around a simple series of four powerchords. The female vocals are great, and reminded us of a cross between modern singers like Lily Allen and Gabrielle Cilmi and 90s indie bands like Sleeper or Elastica, helped by the fuzzy distorted guitars. If we have to criticise (and unfortunately we do!) the lyrics about regretting a broken relationship at times sound a bit cliched, and the drums need to be higher in the mix, but otherwise this is a cracking tune and we reckon it'll be a future crowd pleaser at The Cex's gigs! Nice work!

‘Just Got Paid’ – Duke

This is more a short clip of a guitar and bass driven sequence that could make up a song (rather than a song itself), but it's still seriously funky! Duke's guitar playing has real rhythm, and alternates betwen clean funky riffs and dirtier, bluesy, Hendrix-style licks. Unfortunately there are no drums so the timing is sometimes out, but that will develop with practice. We'd love to hear this developed into a full song with some James Brown style vocals!

‘Master Of Puppets’ – Metal Mike

Alright! Metal Mike had us headbanging up and down the office with this classic tune! It's a brave player who takes on a 'Tallica cover, but emulating the great Hetfield's rhythm style is a sure fire way of improving your own playing. Metal Mike's tone is solid and pretty accurate too, especially as this sounds like it was all recorded in one take! There's room for improvement on the lead work, but then nobody's perfect - even Kirk Hammett... Overall a top attempt at a surprisingly difficult track to nail and well done!

More next month!