The Noise Who Runs – These Will Be Your Gods

By RingMaster Review on February 22, 2023 • ( 0 )

Some of the most fascinating encounters we have come across are those which haunt attention even when ears are elsewhere or other aspects of life command priority. One such proposition is These Will Be Your Gods, the new EP from UK / French electronic-rock project THE NOISE WHO RUNS. It is a release we certainly found plenty to immediately embrace within but it was the seeds of fascination and temptation it laid which were the most powerful and led us back time and time again to an encounter which has simply flourished in persuasion and enjoyment.

THE NOISE WHO RUNS is a project created in 2019 by songwriter and performer Ian Pickering, it emerging three years after he relocated from the North of England to Lille in Northern France. For a great many, Pickering is renowned for his time as part of acclaimed 90s British trip hop outfit SNEAKER PIMPS and now urging new recognition in THE NOISE WHO RUNS alongside Brazilian-born French guitarist Felipe Goes, the band essentially a duo with a trio of well-received Eps already having stirred attention with the 2022 released High Time in Lo-Fi, especially keenly welcomed.

The pair’s sound is a mix of indie rock and electronic experiment primarily but not simply as within the new release alone we sensed post punk, dark wave and new wave essences amongst other flavours. It is a proposal said to be heavily shaped by the 1970’s experimental electronic scene in Sheffield, the 1990’s guitar-house mix of the Manchester scene, and certain moments in the creative guitar-electronic adventure of Primal Scream’s sound which again gives further hinting of its fertile mix.

The EP opens with How U R, a track inspired by The Last Word by 19th Century English poet Matthew Arnold and offering questions for contemplation within an electronica body which from a warning siren and initial vocal query surges with synth pop virulence and electro rock energy. That portentous alarm continues to call out as the song keenly strolls, its musing on the state of humanity wrapped in tenebrific shadows to contrast yet compliment the track’s exuberance.

Cows Come Home follows with its psychedelically shimmering contemplation, a song equally cast in guitar pop and post punk shadowed involvement. It has an absorbing and haunting dirge like quality to it, a lament-esque calling woven with infectious enterprise while the EP’s title track is a noir lit, almost otherworldly proposal which looks at lines of celebrity wielding certain influence and power. It too has a psych shimmer which radiates captivation as rhythms stroll and guitars weave melodic webs within that ethereal electronic intimation. Again light and dark entangle in its splendour, the track taking favourite moment honours with ease.

The release ends with Little Black Cloud, a piece of music which took the imagination on a soaring flight of suggestion and a song which wrapped folkish beauty and pop magnetism together with a kind of XTC meets Jona Lewie touch. It is waltz like in its melancholy lit ramble yet, like all songs within the release, an inspiriting experience even as its words and thoughts warm to the shaded aspects of life.

As we said first off, These Will Be Your Gods struck a chord in an instant but it is over time that its true splendour and prowess emerged and our pleasure and fascination escalated; a partnership still ongoing by the listen.

These Will Be Your Gods is out now via TNWR Records; available @ https://thenoisewhoruns.bandcamp.com/album/these-will-be-your-gods