Description:
The mention of Clearlake might prompt memories of a time before Franz Ferdinand turned the world superfantastiche, but on their third album, Amber, these Sussex indie stalwarts are keen to prove they're anything but yesterday's men. "No Kind Of Life" lights the touchpaper, a rush of heart-pounding melancholy embellished with sparking, flinty guitars, vocalist Jason Pegg intoning "You rely on someone else to make you feel alright/As far as I'm concerned that's no kind of life" with an urgency and determination that belies Clearlake's fey reputation. But perhaps the most intriguing thing about Amber is just how
The mention of Clearlake might prompt memories of a time before Franz Ferdinand turned the world superfantastiche, but on their third album, Amber, these Sussex indie stalwarts are keen to prove they're anything but yesterday's men. "No Kind Of Life" lights the touchpaper, a rush of heart-pounding melancholy embellished with sparking, flinty guitars, vocalist Jason Pegg intoning "You rely on someone else to make you feel alright/As far as I'm concerned that's no kind of life" with an urgency and determination that belies Clearlake's fey reputation. But perhaps the most intriguing thing about Amber is just how hard it is to discern the influences that comprise the precise, artisan-crafted songs that lay within. The hooky "Finally Free" is a curious synthesis of Blur's tuneful angularity and trippy, parallel-dimension Merseybeat, while the hushed title track sees Pegg's heartbroken vocal accompanied only by a sombre swoop of cello and the quiet chimes of a music box. Perhaps it's easiest to forget all reference points and just immerse yourself in Clearlake's spirit of outsider Englishness: take 'Neon', a passionate disavowal of corporate nightlife and high-street consumerism born along gutter-dredging rock riff and the squawk of blues harmonica.--Louis Pattison
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Manufacturer: Domino
Release date: 23 January 2006
EAN: 5034202015222
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