Why I'm looking forward to the Pains' new album

The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart are one of my very favourite bands. I got their eponymous EP what seems like an aeon ago now, picking it up on a whim in Rough Trade East after listening to the first minute or so of the first 3 tracks on the CD player they provide. It got a few listens and then just sat in my CD collection for 18 months or so, until I started hearing more about them during the long build-up to their debut proper. Yes, they blatantly rip off a variety of bands, the most obvious among them Rocketship and early MBV. This isn't a bad thing though. For their first album, they wrote some of the best tunes in the modern indiepop scene, washed them in lovely warm fuzz, and then stuck a couple of songs of proper shoegaze in there for balance. This made it by some considerable distance my record of 2009.

In March, their second album, Belong, will be released. I'm ludicrously excited already. I've seen them live a few times in the last few months, and they've played varying amounts of new stuff. The songs are beginning to creep out to the internet, and some of them are absolute crackers. Heart In Your Heartbreak was the first single from the album (I think - I'm pretty sure Say No To Love was just a standalone single, as it was released about a year ago), and although not particularly subtle showed they haven't lost any of their songwriting talents. Maybe a step away from the American fuzzy Black Tambourine-y indiepop and towards a more clean, upbeat British sound, but this isn't necessarily a bad thing (although we're unlikely to get any songs similar in style to my long-burning favourite of the last album, Stay Alive). Heaven's Gonna Happen Now is probably going to be the next single, as it is the only other new song that is a mainstay of the live set, and is currently only available as an even-more-fuzzy-than-normal video on YouTube. Many of the other songs, the names of which I don't know, were played at a secret gig I went to in August, and so I have a vague idea of what the new album will be like, but this only serves to heighten my anticipation.

Here are videos for a couple of those choice cuts to get you excited too: