Feb 17, 20212 min read

Children of the State’s Tragic Carpet & The Magical Wasp Gang: A Short-Lived Trip Through Vast Music

Image credit: Liv Kenny, Sonic PR

Children of the State’s EP, Tragic Carpet & The Magical Wasp Gang from Notre-Dame is as interesting and out-there as its title implies. The four-track project is drenched in reverb and instrumental experimentation and each track takes the band’s sound into an entirely different sonic space.

This makes it a challenge to trace exactly who Children of the State’s biggest musical influences were while recording their EP. Instead, Tragic Carpet & The Magical Wasp Gang from Notre-Dame hints at a multiplicity of different artistic influences. It often sounds as though The Smiths had a love child with The Black Keys, with a healthy dose of The Beatles’ experimental backwards instrumentation and The Rolling Stones’ Western, heavy rock-and-roll sound thrown in.

Whilst each of the four songs takes the album into drastically different territories, they are linked together by a common mood. Sonic PR has stated that “Tragic Carpet & The Magical Wasp Gang from Notre-Dame is injected with the same sense of unease and paranoia the whole world is feeling right now, and sees the band veer away from the sunny, retro sound of their previous works in order to reflect our current environment.”

While this EP might be more melancholic than Children of the State’s previous efforts, it is also by far their catchiest and most realised work, with each song developing within its three-minute play time. This marks a hopeful turn for Children of the State, as it is clear from these songs that they are actively evolving musically.

The major downside of Tragic Carpet & The Magical Wasp Gang from Notre-Dame is its length. Hopefully, the band will release a full-length album at some point. With only four tracks—each around three minutes long—the EP ends as quickly as it began. While this might mean that the work doesn’t drag on or grow boring, it also doesn’t have time for greatness and is easily forgettable. It is disheartening that Children of the State have yet to release an album larger than four songs.

However, despite issues with the project’s length, Children of the State certainly show great potential and a promise of musical evolution. Of course, if the four tracks featured on Children of the State’s EP weren’t so stellar and expertly crafted, then the short-length of the project wouldn’t be such an issue. This in itself is a triumph, and helps to show that the band is a force to look out for in the future. As it stands though, Children of the State needs to release more material just as powerful, if not better, than Tragic Carpet & The Magical Wasp Gang from Notre-Dame in order to actualise their strong presence in an often oversaturated musical world.