Jonquil - Lily: Track of The Month sorted.
MP3: Jonquil - Lily
(Oxford, 5:03mins, 320 kbps)
‘Lily’ is the first track of the sensational “Lions” (I first wrote the track ‘Lions’ here). It is pulsing with delayed guitar and some great scene setting, anxious but driven Grizzly Bear like uwwwwwwww … & … ahhhhhhhs. Your delicate inner folk strings get teased from about 1:57; notions of Arcade Fire find residence, only to be quickly overcome with beats that’d fit better in an LCD Soundsystem track. But this isn’t dance music. Not even Eastern European dance music.
Finger picked sounds gust and swirl the song, whilst vocals bluster, maintaining the drone and ensuring that this is immediately a song, and by extension, album that surrounds you without swallowing you up into a introverted post-rock black hole. No - this is awesome, expansive and bright folk music delivered sunny side up on a rainy day.
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I can’t recommend picking up the album ‘Lions‘ enough: £9 from their record label Try Harder. Had I heard this album earlier in the year it’d be challenging for one of the best of the year.
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Gorilla Vs Bear suggests a soundtrack to one of my favourite reads of the year, Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road”. Chris also digs Jonquil, so we dig him.
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update: Dodge of the famous and very well thought of My Old Kentucky Blog places Jonquil’s album (which I think he’s only had for a few weeks) ahead of The Shins, Devendra, Tunng, New Pornographers in his best 50 albums of the year list.
Nice site you have here…I like the way you write, and there’s a good mix of music that I am interested in (and might be interested in!). I shall return! :o)
or more like a month knuckles.