Gorilla Manor

Gorilla Manor is no classic – it's too indebted to its makers' influences for that. But it is a strong, striking debut that exceeds expectations and should open enough doors for the band to ensure that album two is immediately placed at the top of journalist must-listen-to piles and consumers' to-buy lists alike.

Gorilla Manor consists of twelve very intricate and charming songs. The record has a sense of liveliness and reaches out to human abilities, emotions and reactions.

Reportedly taking as much time to arrange harmonies as write the music, Gorilla Manor is a definite labour of love, and you know what they say; you get out what you put in. Though it may not be revolutionary, for me, this album is a little gem.

The light continues to shine through "Airplanes" and a clever turn on Talking Heads, but despite the (mostly) joyful chorus, the promising eleation never exactly fulfills its due. However, despite the flaws of their debut, Local natives are one of the more gratifying emergences from East L.A. in recent times. [Winter 2010, p.97]

There's a bit of Broadway, a touch of Motown and a tang of choir nerd to them, but Local Natives avoid the preciousness of Grizzly Bear or the gang-chorus rapture of Arcade Fire. It's a rare band that can use its chemistry as its own instrument.

Local Natives have made a stunning debut, feeling simultaneously familiar and challenging, and presenting a sweeping collection of tracks that are at once cinematic and sonically lush, swelling and serene.

Gorilla Manor is a bit too much of an amalgamation of its bi-coastal influences to really stake out any territory of its own, but it's a handy synthesis of two prevailing sounds.

At first listen that seems off-- the chops and compositional sense here are the most immediately impressive part of the album. But dig deeper and you realize Local Natives never lose sight of the pleasures of being a youthful rock band-- right down to themes of wanderlust and discovery.

Gorilla Manor is a solid and promising debut, but it can come across like it was all conceived by an algorithm designed to mine and and refine indie rock's most fashionable trends.Gorilla Manor is a solid and promising debut, but it can come across like it was all conceived by an algorithm designed to mine and and refine indie rock's most fashionable trends.

By turns exuberant and hushed, intricate and occasionally frenzied, Gorilla Manor more than lives up to its title.

A compelling, intricate album in which to lose yourself.

Except for an impressive reinvention of Talking Heads' "Warning Sign," the rest of Gorilla Manor takes it a bit easier, but these boys never ramble without reason. Even slower bucolic numbers like "Who Knows Who Cares" demonstrate Local Natives' knack for crafting emotive moments that never feel bathetic, as well as technically proficient pop that, in spite of initial impressions, never seems studied.

Gorilla Manor is listenable and inoffensive, but it doesn't express a single aforementioned component of its genre with any gusto.

it's almost impossible to listen to without making comparisons, and Local Natives are not the beneficiaries of the process.

Letting themselves go with greater frequency would turn what is a pretty record into one that actually breaks ground; it'd be sexier that way.

They're not quite as cerebral as Vampire Weekend, but Camera Talk and Cards & Quarters are studded with synapse-snapping shifts in tempo and tone, making this record the place to be as the year ends. [Dec 2009, p.119]