Weeding through emails and press releases can, at times, be tedious and tiresome. That is, until you stumble upon something you immediately know has potential to be amazing. This is the type of experience I recently had when I clicked on an email about a band from the United Kingdom donning the moniker, Vanilla Swingers.

Perplexed by the name, which turns out to be influenced by the book Straw Dogs by John Gray, I hurried to over to their MySpace page and was immediately greeted with the opening lyrics to the more than beautiful “Goodbye Lennon”. When I heard the opening line “Its thirty years since ‘85/ Robbie’s dead but Pete’s alive/ or so the weblogs say” I was immediately entranced, which ultimately led me to do a little more research about the group.

As it turns out Vanilla Swingers is the tandem of Anne Gilpin and Miles Jackson. A little more research added some meaning to the haunting lyrics above. They are readying their first LP for a July 28th release date, and throughout its 9 songs the album details a story of two people, who meet, run away, go back in time, lose each other, and meet again in the year 2015. According to my math 1985 to 2015 is thirty years, makes sense huh? I enjoyed the lyrics to the album immensely. They came across as dark and haunting, but at the same time they were never without a sense of hope.

So musically and lyrically this album is a gem, and it should be a crime if it’s overlooked. Truthfully, I think this album has the makings of 2008’s great underground success story.A little insight on how new Vanilla Swingers are to the game, they played their first live show on May 27th (yeah just a few days ago) at the 12 Bar in London. I would have loved to have been in London that night.

Vanilla Swingers - Danger in the Past (mp3)

Vanilla Swingers - Goodbye Lennon (mp3)