Like so many other British rock bands in the late 1990s, South London four-piece Athlete were caught in the slipstream of Oasis. With a bevy of conventional rock songs and gigs in the usual venues, they attracted the attention of a myriad of record company execs. But rather than taking these early indicators of approval as a license to rock out, they chose to reassess their aims and musical tastes. The quirky Vehicles and Animals shows where this led -- to a unique and singul...  [+]