When reading the release notes for this record, I felt intrigued more than anything, but also optimistic. Camp Hope is made up of Cam Smith (Hotel Books) and Jonathan Sherer – assisted and produced by sometime Hotel Books collaborator Nick Ingram.

Cam has spoken about his admiration for the lyrical content of The Menzingers and Sorority Noise among others, so that’s a good start. They were however, open about their wish to utilise their hip hop and pop influences on the record…and that’s where reality kicks in, to my mind. This album bears almost no relation to the world of those initial references in spite of what they may or may not have been trying to achieve.

The songs are a collection of slightly stark, synth-based pop songs, with very occasional appearances from guitars – either as a languorous solo/outro or just muted plucking to assist the beat in what feels like a grasp for authenticity. What really disappoints though is how much of a cynical attempt this feels at gaining commercial success. In the main, it’s lame, sub-Mike Shinoda-style rapping over pro-tooled backdrops and even the incredibly annoying sampled vocoder vocals thing that has been present on 90% of music in the charts for the last few years. If that wasn’t bad enough, they even go so far as to try the ludicrous and increasingly hackneyed samba/tropical beats on album lowlight “Lover’s Death”.

I’ve done my best to give this album as many listens as I can, but it really is hard going. It’s limp, insipid and boring. Lyrically, it’s aiming for emotional but comes off as trite and immature. Musically, it’s all the things that are overused in modern, commercial music…but overall it somehow manages to be even less than the sum of its parts.

I have done my best to consider this for what it is, but I honestly think it’s just a failed experiment. It also takes itself incredibly seriously, which makes it even less likeable. I take no pleasure in being so negative about anyone’s attempt at doing something a bit different – but this doesn’t work as pop music and even less so as anything other than that.