The Album Leaf - A Chorus of Storytellers (****)If you find The Postal Service a bit too raucous, try Jimmy Lavelle’s woozy electro lullabies. In fact, The Album Leaf (previously a solo nom-de-plume, now extended to a full band line-up) comfortably pre-date the Ben Gibbard/Jimmy Tamberello team-up, with A Chorus Of Storytellers marking a decade of slow-burn minimalism. Its subtlety is either its chief selling point or its principal failing, depending on your taste: the first group will swoon to spluttering beats reminiscent of Four Tet’s Rounds and bask in the gently romantic atmosphere; those in the latter will rub their eyes and appreciate the nap it induced. Assuming you belong to the former, this is a treat, the move from solo bedroom producer to full studio-band help putting flesh on synthetic bones. At any rate, if you’re still awaiting Give Up’s sequel, the Album Leaf are a safer bet than Owl City’s copyright-infringing facsimile, that's for sure.
out now
Musee Mechanique - Hold This Ghost (***)
Taking their name from a curious Californian music-box museum (and conceived in a marginally more prosaic setting, an antique arcade museum), Musée Mécanique’s sound is appropriately nuanced and intricate, with ticking percussion underpinning saw, organ, trumpets, bells and probably a whistle or two to boot. But while I’ve never had the pleasure of perusing such an establishment, I’d imagine that once the initial marvel subsides, all that clockwork can get a bit dull – another, less favourable trait the band occasionally share with their namesake. Everything on Hold This Ghost sounds perfectly placed, but the effect, though pleasingly tuneful, occasionally lacks a pulse - a mechanical amalgamation of Beirut, Mercury Rev and The Notwist’s offbeat symphonies rather than a living, breathing entity in its own right. But at its best there is an elegant beauty to Hold This Ghost’s dustiness, its vintage instrumentation and wistful atmosphere laced with borrowed nostalgia.
Released 15th Feb
Efterklang - Magic Chairs (****)Last year’s Performing Parades captured Efterklang’s enchanting collaboration with the Danish National Chamber Orchestra and effectively encapsulated the band’s inviting oddness. In retrospect it seems like a heraldic full stop, summarising the Parades-period and, if not quite wiping the slate clean, certainly smudging it in preparation for their third album's subtle shift in sound. Casper Clausen’s vocals typify the toned down eccentricities, his emergence as unchallenged front man leads to a more conventional arrangement than their previously rudderless clan sound, but any tempering of their peculiarities feels fresh rather than compromised. Highlights are near-impossible to isolate: Modern Drift sets the tone beautifully; I Was Playing Drums raises goosebumps with its melting strings and trickling piano; and Full Moon is eighties electro-pop filtered through a toyshop orchestra. But ask tomorrow and a different three will likely rise to the top, such is the richness of Magic Chairs’ magisterial elegance.
Released 22nd February
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