OFFICIAL: https://skyorchid.net/
TWITTER: https://twitter.com/skyorchidband
Written
by Frank McClure, posted by blog admin
Hailing
from the small town Midwestern town of Manhattan, Kansas Sky Orchid takes a
page from Deadboy and the Elephant Men, The White Stripes and early Big
Business in terms of keeping their membership succinct. They’re a two-piece fronted by mainly
vocals/guitar and drums (keyboards/piano/percussion for the auxiliary sounds
heard on this record). Sky Orchid
one-ups the competition, going a step farther and being a pair of blood-born
brothers. There’s a definite degree of
musical telepathy involved whenever you get musicians from the same family bond
in a singular project together and it’s all over the group’s debut album, Oculus.
Oculus
packs a lot of variety into its musically ambitious core. Fragments of rock, indie, industrial,
electronica, post-rock and gothic music all emanate from its sonically glowing
mass. Not only does the tight playing
shine, the overall production is pristine and powerful giving even the softest
songs a bottomless depth and immeasurable weight that crashes over the listener
with force and subtle flicker erupting oftentimes within the course of one
song. “The River” proves this thesis
true immediately; relying on brooding piano lines and a witch’s brew of
bubbling drums that explode into spires of heavier guitar
riffage later on. Gabriel
(vocals/guitar) has a solar croon aimed for the sky, giving this material both
malice and menace throughout even when his lyrics reflect on the positive side
of life and love.
“Sneakers”
meditates on trance-y, Euro-style electronica in its early half (though bare
bones and atmospheric as opposed to house music’s bounciness) and turns into a
full-fledged, mid-tempo electro-riff rocker during its latter moments. Though “In the Fire (Part 1)” is an indie
glimmer charmer for the largest part of its duration, the song is unafraid of
some climactic, power-chord scaling when it crescendos and fiery-titled
counterpart “Wildfire” trots along on a bluesy acoustic guitar melody before
again unleashing some riff-centric finish work.
Elsewhere, “I’ll Stop The World (Part 2)” hurries the pace and goes for
a 90s sort of riff-scorch ballast that meets in middle-ground with the keyboard
enhanced goodness of recent acts like The Killers or Canada’s Econoline Crush
circa The Devil You Know. “Lex” is a crunching, drum-beaten psychedelic
work that launches into the 1-2 bass-y grooves of “Breathe Easy (the duo’s
oldest composition at 7 years’ aged)” and the downright positive “Take It All’s”
cleanly woven guitar melodies.
“Yesterday” and album round-up number “Fortify” plunge more space-y and
thoughtful textures in their droning, trippy electronica washed rock
guises.
Oculus is a powerful
work from a young band that’s grown far beyond their humble garage
beginnings. With touring runs taking
them all through Kansas, to Houston and Nashville (mainly for recording
purposes), they’ve grown this project into something that the world needs to
hear. The brothers’ inventive take on
songwriting and locked-on musical dynamics have rendered them a debut that’s
all killer and no-filler. Even the
atmosphere-oriented compositions are of a highly quality and never devolve into
boredom or tedium. Oculus should please a wide berth of music fans of all styles and
genre interests.
No comments:
Post a Comment