christiansilva - bring his head ep
a debut ep from this london band consists of 8 tracks in 20 minutes that will have your head spinning in all directions. first few plays i just discounted the sounds a blatant attempt at cashing in on the recent piano driven rock of keane, but as someone delicately pointed out, keane didn't invent the piano, so i went back and listened again. and again. and again.
and now. well i still hear the influence of the oh so sensitive keane stylings, but there is also a depth and quality that makes this ep far more special. a lot of this, is down to the unique vocals of guy hardy (the main man of the band), his voice soars and reaches into new regions, but rarely steps into that area of pain like muse often do, though thee fuzzed up bass driven 'chopping board' gets a little too bloody close ! the instrumentation on the whole is fresh and full of splendour, with some lovely twists and turns, making songs come on like a crossbreed experiment of tune heavy radiohead (the bends era), a dash of the operatics of queen, suedes glam.
so to start things off, we get the synthetic strings on the dramatic opener, 'first last gasp', setting out the atmosphere perfectly, which just as the crescendo peaks we are dropped into the piano intensive 'why should i' that will have radio2 listeners gagging at the bit, a standout track that reveals the rich talent on offer. 'movie night' consists of a gorgeous simple banjo loop, deep bass rumble and david lynch-esque atmospherics with vocal declarations that guy could be captain fantastic. yeah ok. still the track is wonderful, whereas the layered vocal weirdness that is 'boardroom' proves that the band have listened to a lot of prog rock and decided to play around during their first forays into the recording studio - especially as this was supposed to be a basic 2 track debut release. however, the band let loose, and ended up with a lot more, and so the label with total dedication decided to release the whole lot.
following the twisted 'the boardroom', the ep settles down for the final three tracks with the band getting into their epic melodic stride proving that given half a chance christiansilva could become a serious contender for some major attention in 2006 as this debut ep shows a real intention to step aside from the current post-punk movement and add a little more glamour to the world.
track listing :
first last gasp
why should i
movie night
the chopping board
rocket science
peter pan
houseguests