Yahoo! Music Album Review

Released on 10/7/06
Label: Polydor

"You're never going to top birdsong as the ultimate pop music; all we can do is try to come close." So says Fyfe Dangerfield, singer-songwriter and creative linchpin of Guillemots. Presumably he has the sweet trill of the blackbird in mind here rather than say, the mynah's caw, but whatever his band's avian inspiration, as aesthetic spurs go, it's pretty eccentric.

Eccentric is a key word where this quartet is concerned. Not only does their line-up feature a classically trained double bass player and a Brazilian former death-metal guitarist - but they are diametrically opposed to expressions of angst, aggro, "attitude" and the general, swaggering arsiness that seems to fire so much contemporary British pop music. With their grand orchestrations, love of idiosyncratic detail and self-consciously old-school dynamics (more of which later), Guillemots sound refreshingly out of temper with the times.

"Through The Window Pane" is their debut, eagerly awaited after a couple of well-received singles and a slavering industry reception at this year's SXSW festival. It demonstrates both pianist Dangerfield's maverick compositional skills and his obvious love of classic pop. "I don't think there's a greater art than writing a three-minute pop song that people can sing when they're drunk," he has claimed, which might explain his apparent reluctance to extend his adventurism from content to form and his unwillingness to push past Keane-like notions of the epic sweep.

Co-producer Dangerfield's decision not to use the ubiquitous compression technique (smoothes out differences in dynamics, minimises instrumental detail, generally pumps up the volume) was an interesting one, given that the bands Guillemots are most influenced by - The Blue Nile, Prefab Sprout, Hurrah!, The Dream Academy - were working in the '80s, when producers were compression-crazy. Consequently, the album is intriguingly layered - full of listening peaks and valleys which pull you into the source of its soft sounds - but it stops frustratingly short of greatness.

The title track is a thing of urgent, fluttering beauty, the keening desolation of "Redwings" (which features a colliery band and Joan As Police Woman on backing vocals) so divine you can't decide whether to smile or sob and the 11-minute-plus closer, "Sao Paulo" nothing less than majestically mad in its suggestion of Paul Buchanan joining David Axelrod's orchestra for a spot of nuevo tango. Bouquets for those. Brickbats, however, for the irritatingly springy (lord - bongos!) "Annie, Let's Not Wait", "Blue Would Still Be Blue", which reveals the strain of Dangerfield's under-accompanied voice (he's no Rufus Wainwright) and "We're Here", a bloated, Keaneplay hybrid aimed squarely at the top of the charts.

That, of course, is where Guillemots are ultimately headed. Yes, these birds can fly, but ultimately, "Through The Window Pane" lacks the courage of their visionary convictions.

    by Sharon O'Connell