Sleigh Bells

I've been waiting for this for a long time. I first heard of the Sleigh Bells ( consisting of singer Alexis Krauss and guitarist/producer Derek Miller) on an alternative music section of a hip hop message board last year and fell in love with their song "Crown on the Ground", even with the sometimes painful poor quality of their demo songs. Their official debut album 'Treats' features some previously unheard songs mixed with some all ready known songs that are either heavily touched up, retitled, or reworked all together, such as the demo song "Beach Girls" with was transformed into "Kids" with children replacing Alexis and Derek on the speaking breaks during the song. I have to say that I like the untouched original better.

The standout tracks are "Crown on the Ground", "Rill, Rill", "Tell Em" "A/B Machines" among others. This is a good album that manages to polish the Sleigh Bells sound but also maintain the rawness that people feel in love with. The one draw back is that the album is very short at only 32 minutes, making 'Treats' seem more like glimpse of what the Sleigh Bells are capable of instead of a proper more expansive debut. Then again the album like the music itself, short and sweet or should I say loud. This is a hot one so pick it up now!!!