Organ Grinder are a new, British-based label who are keen to put artistic considerations first, and W&H are only too happy to support them if their releases are all up to the standard of this excellent, enigmatic debut album from shadowy quintet FIREWORKS NIGHT.
According to the press release, the ten tracks making up "It's A Wide, Wide Sea" were conceived as acoustic songs, with the band adding colour (often in the shape of unlikely instruments such as banjos, mandolins and theremins) in a way that would ensure the end results were both "polished" and "defaced".
Well, it's a process that seems to have worked a treat anyway, for most of "It's A Wide, Wide Sea" makes for compelling, and often unsettling listening, with the songs often taking a while to stretch out and creep into chilling corners along the way. Opening track "The Gold Leaves" gives you some idea of the territory we're veering into here, built around a fragile electric guitar strum and James Lesslie's shakily emotional voice. By the time the plot has unfolded, Briony Greenhill has joined in to duet and the band's brooding presence (akin to Low or a very low-watt Calexico) has made itself felt. It's great, and by the time they hit that fatalistic chorus line "There will always be a blackness to consume us", they've hit upon something deathly and resonant that even Will Oldham would approve of.
It's only the tip of the iceberg, too, it seems, for the album spills a hoard of further treasures as it staggers through its' dark night of the soul. "The Shiver In Your Bones" is another early highlight, and - arguably - this writer's fave track. This one throws curves aplenty, inching into life with banjos and vinyl crackles akin to M Ward and then settling on a skeletal blues with a jaywalking bassline and Nick Cave-ish carny organ adding colour to the plot. It's lyrical intrigue opens with the wonderful line "The carnival is over, the fireworks have all gone off/ I trace the love back to the shiver in your bones" (brr!) and serves up some brilliantly discordant lead guitar a la Blixa Bargeld before it signs off. Rather tremendous all round, really.
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Elsewhere, Fireworks Night pull off all manner of unlikely victories. "Something Like A Trembling", for example, is smoky and minimal, showcasing an impressive Briony vocal and tremulous piano, while the mandolin-assisted "A Picture Worth Framing" is a skewed lullaby and bruised country-folk at its' best. "The Silhouettes Attack!", meanwhile, is an ambitious affair, where tinkly glockenspiels go head to head with theremins, overheating guitars and overwrought vocals from Lesslie, yet somehow it all hangs together beautifully over the distance.
They sensibly save the fine title track to the last, as well. "It's A Wide, Wide Sea" itself is framed by melancholic electric piano and allows gentle feedback and discord to seep into a song of loss and parting with a few ambiguous twists to keep you guessing right to the fade. It's a strange, dislocated set-piece and somehow just the right way to sign off, whetting our appetite for a second album which I'm reliably informed the band have already started on.
Fireworks Night, then, provide us with a display that's both beautiful and deadly. "It's A Wide, Wide Sea" is refreshingly free of squibs and suggests this band's creativity will burn brightly long into the future.
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