The relatively niche genre of shoegaze music, when done correctly, can be beautiful and dreamy, languid and grandiose, and very easy to lose yourself in. When done incorrectly it sounds whiney and dull, pretentious and bloated, and can lead to anger in listeners. Amusement Parks On Fire unfortunately lean towards the latter description more than they do the former.

The fault comes from attempting to streamline a sound that should only exist on the fringes of music, there for those who know where to look for it, unfettered by the majority of pop music. So this is why Road Eyes, the band’s third full length record on as many labels, sounds confused when it tries to make straight forward rock songs with highly distorted guitars, dreary vocal melodies, slow tempos and swirling strings. If you took the alternative rock sensibilities of Nada Surf and piled Sigur Rós at their artiest on top of them then this record could well be the result. As interesting as that sounds on paper it’s not a super group that anybody asked for, or that anybody needs.

The record is not without its high points – “Road Eyes” is a good introduction to the sound of the record, the coda of “Inside Out” is quite lovely, all swooning strings and emotive singing, and album closer “Inspects The Evil Side” is requisitely epic – but unfortunately they are few and far between and somewhat marred by tracks like “Raphael” and “Wave Of The Future” which plod along doing not much at all.

By trying to update a sound that didn’t require it Amusement Parks On Fire have fallen short of delivering a pop rock record or a record that wears its artistic tendencies on its sleeve, settling for the confusing middle ground and a wasted opportunity.

Conclusio - Immediate, but ultimately shallow.