April 7, 2010

Retro Masterpiece: Dark Captain Light Captain

Miracle Kicker 


This debut LP from 2008. is a real treat. Sitting down to listen to it again before writing this review, I couldn't help myself, and at the end, had to play it all over again...

Supported by the likes of Zane Lowe, Rob Da Bank and Mark Radcliffe, amongst others, DCLC specialise in a gorgeous sort of trippy folk-music. The press release mentions both The Strawbs and Can, and that seems appropriate. I'd be willing to bet that the people who fell in love with the Erland Oye-Royksopp-Kings Of Convenience Norwegian axis will fall in love with this too.

Sure, mixing electronica and folk is far from a new idea, but hearing it done this well is a rare treat. From opener 'Jealous Enemies' to closer 'Miracle Worker' this album is consistently wonderful. 

The album is a font of glistening guitar plucking, hushed harmonizing vocals, and brisk brushed drumming over a bed of lushly layered keyboard swells. The entire effort swims in a deep ocean of melancholy, but retains a lightness, a buoyancy in the atmosphere that prevents the band and the listener from drowning. What strikes me the most with this record is its pacing and tempos, in that, though the vocals and strings call you, like sensual sirens, to crash and founder upon their beautiful shores, the drumming presses each song steadily onward toward completion. Even if you were to remove the rhythm section to discover a fairly typical folk act, their voices and instrumental arrangements still rich and enchanting. 

 
Miracle Kicker is full of life and replete with a high degree of musicianship; there should be more bands like this one out there helping to redefine how folk and pop really could sound.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
 

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