(r) - In Pink [Important Records - 2007]Don’t be deceived by In Pink’s title, there's nothing pink, fluffy or cute about it. It really goes to the other extreme being a collection of pained, life worn down psychedelic rock/ synth scapes with high amounts of melancholy pop run through out its audio life. This is music that nods towards the likes of Leonard Cohen, Michael Gira and the Swans in their latter days. With an added dark cinematic wonder and dark psychedelic understanding and nodding towards the churning and lucid world of Kruatrock, with odd dances into creepy carnival/ folk air too. Each track is deeply pained and deep in the blues, not the musically form but the feeling. At times the bleakness can get too much even with it's tuneful flesh, which feels like death smiling through a beautiful face at you, This weeps of our mortality, the certainly of decay and loss. To build this slide into pure hopeless-ness the following are used: Piano, guitar acoustic and electric, electric Viola, electric and air organ, harp and glockenspiel. With clever, creepy and disorientating subtle placing of field recordings to really build up the atmosphere. A rewarding ,captivating grim and often nightmarish jouney that nicely mixes bleak pop, psychedelic rock, and grim cinematics. Just doesn’t play if you’ve just broken up with your loved one or suffered a loss ,this could well push you over the edge. Oh and one more thing, the weird out of focus cover pic brings to mind fond memories of bleak baby eating 80’s zombie movie Anthopophagous The Beast, which cant be bad…. Roger Batty
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