You want to listen to a band who wore folk/country/indie influences on their sleeves but still pulled off a decent album of enjoyable and exciting music? Larrikin Love is the band for you. Too bad that they haven’t been a band for almost ten years now. “The Freedom Spark” was the only album they released during their short spell in 2006 before the members went their separate ways the following year; the good thing is that it is worth a listen if you have the time.

With an upbeat tempo accompanied by sprightly violins and banjos, the lyrics concern a narrator who takes an innocent stroll in the fields on a summer’s day, where the birds are singing and flying through the skies, to get away from the city. But he wails that he is ‘choked with fear’ in the cathartic choruses in which, after a split second of feedback, the roaring guitars kick things into another gear. Why does he feel like this? Well, things take a dark turn in the final verse. I’ll leave it at that.

I haven’t listened to this song in a long time. It’s a song that I was very much more into when I was eleven. The music doesn’t sound dated (at least not to me), but there’s something about it that takes me back to that age. It is still a knee-slapper after all this time.