The Son(s): Leviathan EP (Olive Grove)

I think the winters of 2009-10 and 2010-11 are probably going to be etched onto my mind forever. The first was miserable, grappling with long-term sickness, and wondering how I was going to get through. The next one the situation had changed: I was working for library services, and Mrs. 17 Seconds was expecting a baby. The weather was even worse, and we muddled through. Healthy baby boy, now aged fourteen months.

It was clearly a long winter for others as well. The promotional notes for The Son(s) follow-up to last year’s fine self-titled debut LP (do check it out) read: “These songs were sung and recorded in an old cold, empty, echoey flat in Edinburgh. Away from home, stuck in the dark middle of winter. It was the coldest winter there for more than 50 years. Temperatures fell to minus 14C. It was colder at night, colder still at home. Snow fell, trains stopped.” Yet out of it was born this fine six track EP.

Checking in at twenty minutes, there’s sufficient difference in these tracks to really draw you in. Second track ‘If I Hear You Talk apostrophes Again’ is quite uptempo, whereas the opener ‘Roaring Round The House’ and ‘Half Lived’ are more reflective. I’ve always felt the cold, bleak Scottish winters seeped into the sound that Mogwai make (check out anything from their Chemikal Underground phase for particualr proof of this), and in a totally different way so it proves to be the case with Leviathan.

This is a beautiful EP. Take the time to check it out.

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Leviathan is out now on Olive Grove