Born to the sounds of Barry Manillow and The Carpenters, raised on romantic comedies, and schooled in failed love and misfiring lust? Absentee emerge well-versed in the rigours of romance with their finest album to date, Victory Shorts. Finding a seat somewhere between unreachable romanticism and hopeless realism, Victory Shorts offers lush mini romantic tragedies for those who thought Casablanca ended a little too abruptly. Album opener 'Shared' sets the scene with a couple pleased as punch that they found each other, until things take a darker turn with Absentee smashing their way through 'Boy, Did She Teach You Nothing?' latest EP title-track 'Bitchstealer' and 'Love Has Had Its Way' in an attempt to get to the truth of the matter: Happy endings don't come easy.