This is Protection… We wouldn’t doubt it

LPs round-up: Scarlet Chives, 65daysofstatic, Angèle David-Guillou

Published on September 27th, 2013 | Jonny Abrams

We listen to so many albums at Rocksucker that occasionally we have to do a sort of round-up thingy like the following, which includes reviews of new albums from Scarlet Chives, 65daysofstatic and Angèle David-Guillou.

Read ’em! No weeping, though. Not here.

Scarlet Chives – This is Protection

We were switched on to this lot when a trusted advisor directed us towards the decidedly NSFW video to their “The Timber Will Fall” single. We’ve embedded it below, but be warned: don’t watch it just before lunch.

The song itself is fantastic, a spellbinding acoustic guitar motif laid over a distant, pounding rhythm that builds into blaring malevolence as weird whirring electronics grind ghostishly away in the background.

Maria Mortensen’s vocals are equal parts unhinged and captivating, soaring squealingly heavenwards on opening tracks “Hunting” and “The Rooms Are Too Small” as if Sigur Rós went electropop and took some gleefully menacing twists and turns in its midst.

“Sohn” sounds like some fantastical vivid dream, at least until it explodes into monstrousness; “Show the Rest” manages to uphold the magical properties even while eliciting from us such descriptions as ‘twisted’ and ‘heaving’; “Lift” conjures a splendour with its bubbling synth arpeggios, and “Eyes Go Dim” erupts postrockishly into magnificence.

These are all good reasons to check out This is Protection Scarlet Chives.

This is Protection is out now on WM Norway.

BUY: This is Protection on Amazon.

Rocksucker says: Four Quails out of Five!

65daysofstatic – Wild Light

This Sheffield bunch’s sixth LP is impressively sculpted out of chattering, skittering electronics, textural synth pads, crashing drums and roaring guitars, but it just feels like a very grand round of wheel-reinventing.

Basically, it’s the kind of minor-key portent that has become post-rock’s default setting, the same overused progressions on every track. There’s something on opening track “Heat Death Infinity Splinter” that sounds like a dinosaur roaring, and this is about as interesting as it gets.

If you’ve never heard any of their work before, or indeed anything by Mogwai, GY!BE, Sigur Rós, Explosions in the Sky etc., then this will sound bloody amazing to you. Otherwise, it all feels deflatingly familiar.

Wild Light is out now on Century Media.

BUY: Wild Light on iTunes and on Amazon.

Rocksucker says: Two and a Half Quails out of Five!

Angèle David-Guillou – Kourouma

An exquisite series of reveries hewn from piano, electric piano, string, glockenspiel, sweetly operatic female vocal, singing saw…it’s a bit like North Sea Radio Orchestra scoring a Richard Kelly film.

There’s a state of disturbed somnambulance woven through these minor-key submergences, one of arresting resonance, and the perturbed reimagining of “Silent Night” that concludes “Dream of Leonor Fini” is a wonderful touch.

Rocksucker says: Four Quails out of Five!

BUY: Kourouma on Amazon.

Artists: 65daysofstatic, angele david-guillou, scarlet chives

About the Author

Jonny Abrams Editor of Rocksucker and the website's founder, Jonny is passionate about the music he listens to, both good and bad, as well as interviewing his favourite musicians.