OUR FAMOUS DEAD – Clockwork Heartbeats CD-EP
I've been to Workington – not the most obvious place in the world for creativity to flourish, that's for sure – but in the deepest depths of the place there lurks a guy named Andrew Reeves – and he's doing something you're going to like – a lot!!
“Years ( An Introduction”) opens the EP with a river of electronics and clattering percussive undercurrents as an ocean of multi-tracked female vocals intones with the voices of angels, almost like the hookline to “Let The Sunshine Through” by some dance artist or other a while back, but this is seriously siren-like, inviting you into its charms with gorgeous outstretched hands – the suddenly the spell is broken – and, with the sound of the angels soaring in your ears, the massive chugging beats of electronics, percussive and dirty riffing guitars motors through your skull as sneering, seething vocals soar through the verse before another abrupt stop and then this massive amalgam of the angelic voices, the huge sounding instrumentation and the hollering vocals, all rise to this mighty chorus that takes your head off, before dropping down to another verse and starting the process all over. A mid-song break with all manner of samples acts as a middle eight before the chorus crashes into view once more and it all flies towards a glorious finale. Just awesome!!
“England's Burning” fires up with the powerful vocal sneer and a river of thunderous electro-percussives and electronics, this time a mass of rhythmic and power layers coming from all sorts of electric and electronic instrumentation as the song twists and turns through an industrial dance territory that sucks you in to its hurricane of depths, layers and beats. Again, the song veers off to a region of space with electronics, barely heard treated voice samples, throbbing beats and more, before scorching back into the chorus and roaring to the end of the song.
“Stars” starts with crashing electronic drums and buzz-saw electronic rhythms as this booming electronic bass enters, a river of synths underneath and this hushed menacing vocal croons out the lyrics as rhe whole thing marches onwards. Then suddenly the vocal flares up as the drums thunder and the chorus comes down on you like a juggernaut, before they drop back down to the menacing verse once more and this is the pattern of events that keeps you hooked, although, as you'd now expect, the song does move off path in the middle to a more anthemic arrangement before heading back to what started the whole thing off, but it works a treat as this huge sounding mass of sounds throbs, drives and meanders its way to your soul.
Finally, “Shadows of Our Sun”, roars into life with clattering drums, dirty guitar riffs and bass before it all suddenly changes to jittery electronics and menacing vocals, but then changes again into a scary chorus with samples and screams and crunching beats, electronic rivers and deep guitar riffs, before reverting back to the verse, taking another path of stretched out vocal menace over scorching electronic layers and then back to the scary choruses. Overall, formulaic, it may be, in the way the songs are arranged, in the sense that you see the style of the composer, but the songs themselves are stunning – it's like a scary Prodigy dropping the overt commercialism and substituting it with an inventive spirit that seriously draws you in.
Andy Garibaldi (Dead Earnest) 09-09