Fact #152314

You know something’s happening when real people, the ones not in the music industry, start telling you to check out a new band. I got to Gomez when sundry friends told me they’d seen them on support gigs where they blew away the headline act. Besides, any band that coalesced around a rejection of Manchester’s baggy scene and a desire to outgrow their own teenage metalhead fixations has to be worth hearing. With the advantage of two very distinctively different vocalists ( Ben Ottewell employs a raw roar not unlike Gary Stringer in Reef while Tom Gray has a more traditionally appealing tone) they can attack a range of styles without sounding contrived, harnessing the traditional values of quality rock with the energy, emotion and unbridled imagination of youth. This could well be looked back on as the most significant rock band debut of 1998.
(Source : Johnny Black review in Hi Fi News, July 1998)