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Review: 'KODIAK DEATHBEDS'
'Kodiak Deathbeds'   

-  Label: 'Affairs Of The Heart'
-  Genre: 'Alt/Country' -  Release Date: '25th September 2015'-  Catalogue No: 'HUG 027'

Our Rating:
Derek Fudesco (The Murder City Devils, Pretty Girls Make Graves and The Cave Singers) and Amber Webber (Black Mountain and Lightening Dust) have come together to make this rather exceptional album.

Whatever type of racket they have made in the past this album has a low-key, sitting on the porch and singing songs to no one in particular type of vibe. It is mostly gentle practice amp electric and occasional acoustic guitar married to Amber's stunning voice, including harmonic overdubs and that is really it.

What takes it above the usual fare is the strength of the songs. They seem to be mostly about relationships and although there is no dark undertow as such, there is certainly a plaintive quality that pulls at the heart strings. A further clue to that mood comes in the titles. 'Wild Hearts', 'Cross That Line', 'Rattle and Roar' and 'Against the Wind' tell you that something powerful is afoot.

Although comparisons are hideously unfair and generally misleading, I can't help thinking of 'Trinity Session' Cowboy Junkies. One is tempted to say this is the album they were destined to make but as I am hopeful it won't be the first I won't go quite that far. It is a damn fine idea and one well executed nevertheless.

One slight criticism would be that the second half of the album doesn't quite live up to the first (see the aformentioned titles plus opener 'Never Change') as latterly it appears to be even more 'rootsy' and it doesn't hit me in the stomach in quite the same way. Really don't get the cover artwork either (floating furniture?) but I am probably missing a trick there.

Whatever, this album is worth the admission fee for the first five songs alone. They are mountainous country blues and as I look out of my window at a grey, wet, end of English summer day, I feel a trip to Virginia looming large in my imagination.       
  author: Leo Newbiggin

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KODIAK DEATHBEDS - Kodiak Deathbeds