It’ll say a lot about how long Dead Mellotron have been on
my radar when I say I first came across em on MySpace. It sticks in the memory
because they felt like one of the only bands I ever discovered through it – most
of it was just rubbish as we all know. But over the course of a couple of free EPs
they experimented with various sounds and ideas and approaches. It was always
vaguely around an updated My Bloody Valentine esqe thing – closer to the
dreamier end of that spectrum, mixed with some interesting beat ideas, whether
electronic or kit work.
It’d be fair to say that isn’t a million miles from where we
are here, just a hell of a lot more honed and carefully constructed.
For a start we have the mandatory nothing songtitles like Can’t See and Bye but that aside this EP / mini album mixes the classic shoegaze
/ post rock moves with something a little different, something unseen and
hidden in shadow, whilst simultaneously managing to work in some pop grooves
too.
The seven tracks all lead into one another forming a large,
beautiful, self referencing whole. We have ghostly, indistinct and dreamy
vocals, cuts of backwards guitar, euphoric highs and subtle Wurlitzer type
lines underneath the whole racket. Somehow, despite hitting every MBV type
touchstone, it manages to maintain a character all of its own, a void to get
lost in. It’s a trick that was honed over their experimental self releases but
arrives perfectly formed for this, their first release proper.
It’s only weaknesses lie in personal taste really. Songs are
hard to distinguish from one another because of the structure of the album. I
love that personally. There are plenty of little touches that get lost in the
first few listens, partly because they sit in the middle of ‘songs’ that
already don’t have a start and end. It won’t work so well on yr iPod basically.
Personally, I’d rather bang on a whole album at a time anyway.
The record really comes into it’s own over the last few
songs, building layers of skyraising epicness, shifting em away, then coming
back twice as strong. It’s a work of great detail and very much worth searching
out. Don’t be put off by the old MBV comparison; its something I know gets
thrown about too much and most who try ape them fail miserably. This is
actually rather excellent.
Dean Freeman
No comments:
Post a Comment