Skip navigation | Hello Netscape 4.x (or other older browser) User! The Southern web site is optimised for viewing in newer web standards compliant browsers (firefox, safari, opera, ie6). You still have full access to the content of this site but the layout is simplified. Please take this opportunity to freely upgrade to a browser from the last few years to enjoy the enhanced layout. you can use the keyboard to select the main options via access keys at any time: n = news, t = tours, l = labels, g = gallery, d = forums/discussions c = contact h = home/main page, u = upcoming releases, r = recent releases, s = skip navigation.
Third album in two-and-a-bit years from this trio of downbeat
Brooklynites makes up in soft-spoken grandeur what it lacks in titular
inventiveness.
The legend "Featuring the drummer form Codeine" may not guarantee must-buy
status in your neck of the woods, but this fiercely unassuming record
deserves the chance to weave its tender spell. Sombre without being
depressing, stately without being ponderous, intricate without being
fussy, it takes the advances in technique and dynamics evident on last
year's C several steps further on.
A six and a half minute opening track suggests either justified confidence
or egotistical insanity, and as the gentle swirl of Gathered stubbornly
refuses to outstay its welcome, hats fly into the air and ticker-tape
falls like snowflakes in the courtyard. Cello and viola and occasional
bouzouki add texture without diminishing cohesion.
The stirring Jet and the buoyant Balloon take the songwriting honours, and
Curtis Harvey's voice is strong and sweet enough to make instrumentals an
appetising interlude rather than a blessed release.
Ben Thompson
Mojo, November, 1997
BACK