You’ve no doubt at some point caught yourself thinking, in-between episodes of Gilmore Girls, “What if Fall Out Boy came from Weymouth in Sussex?” Well what started out as a mere hiccup in your bored brain has convinced itself into reality, in the form of band You Me At Six. 

Hold Me Down is the band’s second studio album, and when Branson was flying past Weymouth in his hot air balloon and heard them recording he knew two things: 1. He should not fly so close to the ground in his hot air balloon. 2. He must release this album.

Now the UK has its own Fall Out Boy, and they’re on a major label. To make yanks feel even more jealous they also sound sort of like Taking Back Sunday too. Ha! Come on UK!

What is it with modern pop rock bands and that breathing thing they do anyway? Listen carefully…when the singer is singing a really emotional bit, he’ll start breathing really heavily whilst he’s singing really softly, and sometimes suck air in really loudly, like he’s having sex and an asthma attack and singing all at the same time. That’s basically how to be sexy these days. Try it on your partner after reading this.

Anyway, so it’s punchy and upbeat and the lyrics are all about girls and some of them are kind of sarcy and some are sort of poetic. We’ve been taken up this road before. One time I went up it with Fall Out Boy themselves, and I actually really enjoyed it. Patrick, Pete and Co. showed me the road for what it was, and pointed out some interesting landmarks like ‘Decent Riff’, ‘Catchy Chorus’, and even ‘Genuine Sentiment’.

When You Me at Six grabbed my hand, and dragged me skipping and jumping along, like a theme park maintenance man on my umpteenth journey down the Tunnel of Love, I felt nothing. They know, you know and I know this is old news, and it still sells like hotcakes. So it’s really hard to criticise with any malice or sense of perspective. Good luck!

Release Date 11/01/2010 (Virgin)