Efterklang -‘Magic Chairs.’ (4AD)
This is the Danish band’s third album, and their first for their new label, 4AD. This is a beautiful album that is at once epic and yet subtle, epic without the bombast, if you like. Right from the opening track ‘Modern Drift’ the scene is set: simple and effective pop melodies that are joyous yet with an underlying current of sadness underneath.
Like many of the best albums, this is an album that begs for repeated playing. This is not because it’s hard to get into – on the contrary – but because the subtlety of the musical layers means that each successive play reveals something previously unheard. Thomas Husmer’s trumpet playing is a delight yet it’s so gently mixed in that it gently eases a song such as ‘Alike’ into being, rather than birthing it kicking and screaming.
Rather like fellow Danes Mew, Efterklang appear to be playing a genre of music that we might almost be tempted to call post-rock pop, if it wasn’t for the fact that the concept sounds so much like citrus mixed with dairy. But it’s the inventiveness of post-rock – a fairly anti-single type of music mixed with the structure of a good classic pop song -and few musics are as single friendly as pop music. Fans of Broken Records (now labelmates of Efterklang) may find much to enjoy here as well, in terms of music that is orchestral, yet a thousand miles away from the syrupy MOR that usually implies.
Oh, sod it, it’s a bloody great album. Just make sure you hear it!
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