Moleskin is a French band that was formed back in 2002.

Well, to begin with I must admit I neither read nor speak French (I studied Spanish in high school), and that has given me some serious problems reviewing this band. Most of the press material I have received, and their website is in French, and that doesn’t help me very much to form an impression of the band. There’s some English on their MySpace page, but that’s all I could find in English about them and their mini-album. I can see they play some live shows (13 in 2007), that they consist of four members, and what gear they play, but that’s about it.

So the music must mostly speak and stand for itself on this 6 track (demo?) EP/CD:

They say, that they’re inspired by such different bands as Beatles and Metallica – well, maybe they listen to them in their spare time, but where the inspiration comes into their music, I really have a hard time telling…There’s neither the song writing abilities of either of those bands nor the classic pop quality of the Beatles or the aggression of the young Metallica in Moleskin – to be honest, I’m just bored after just a few minutes. Only exception is track 3 Out Of Control that has some of the right Stoner feeling.

The sound and the riffs of the guitar is typical Stoner, but it seems Moleskin really doesn’t have anything new to offer to the genre, I miss some hooks that stays after the CD is done, and that makes me want to listen to it again – they’re simply not there, this is just repeating something I’ve already heard before. Furthermore I don’t like the drum sound at all, it’s way to thin for my taste, especially for a band that wants to play Stoner-rock, and in the vocals as well, I miss the raw and deep sound that many other singers of Stoner bands have. Generally the sound is like a (better) rehearsal recording with random mixing and the sound is too “nice”, not nearly raw enough – it’ doesn’t grab me.

Nice cover and graphics though – unfortunately it’s better than the music.