At just over 31 minutes this is a lean, energetic and contagious debut of pop songs by London ‘new wave/punk’ band, Circuits. From the disjointed Clash-esque guitars on ‘City of Lights’ on in the band treat the listener to bouncy bass lines, racing beats and infectious melodies. There are obvious comparisons to be made with The Police, The Specials and Television but my ears hear a bizarre combination of the Kooks and Sublime.

Every song sounds like a potential single, but a compilation of potential singles doesn’t necessarily add up to a good album. The album plays too much like a greatest hits in that all the interesting stuff that’s happened between each track is missed out; and their lead man is a bit too fond of witty sounding one-liners which are just that, witty sounding. Particularly nice tracks are ‘The Choir Invisible’, ‘Young Enough Not to Care’ and ‘A Thousand Ideas’.

However, all in all, Bright As Midnight is an agreeable, but ultimately disposable, collection of songs.

Farshad Mahmood