A quirky young female singing from the perspective of a tough male character may sound like a recipe for disaster but this stunning single is one you can listen to over and over again and still find something new.
Brighton's Gemma Williams has burdened herself with a loopy stage name but this shouldn't detract from the hard, uncompromising subtext within her songs.
Her quivering voice packs a hefty emotional punch that, coming from such an unlikely source, is all the more powerful.
Gull is the second single from her marvellous debut album The Bird School Of Being Human. On the LP it follows another song (Red Kite) on the theme of domestic violence sung from the point of view of the victim.
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Gull takes us into the head of perpetrator as he confesses to his crime over breakfast of egg, chips and beans at a greasy spoon cafe: "I couldn't see a way out, so, yeah, I knocked her out".
As she recounts his wretched tale, the plucked harp gives way to a glitchy beats and ends with massed squawks of seagulls to add to the chilling Hitchcockian mood.
The effect is both mesmerizing and menacing.
Woodpecker Wooliams' website
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