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6 / 10 For anyone who finds the Midlands massive a bit too lunk-headed for comfort, The Ripps could be the way forward. Two sons of refugees from General Pinochet’s Chile plus a fox-like lady, they hail from Coventry, drive a van called Sheila and play a heady brew of Supergrass-ish ska-pop jammed through a glam-rock filter. Best track by far is the single ‘Loco’, with a chartward bounce in its spring-loaded step, but their screwball pop songs never go beyond simply being memorable. Their lyrical vignettes of city-centre punch-ups outside Wetherspoons and benefit fraud can sound a bit clunky, but that’s only when held up against the laureate of the genre, Alex Turner. It’s likely that The Ripps will live at least long enough to have a proper shot at things.

Dan Martin

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