Haunting to the point of being disturbing, sombrely magnetic to the edge of invasive seduction, the self-titled debut album from Austria quartet, Lady Lynch, is quite simply one of the year’s essential explorations especially if your appetite has a hunger for shadow fuelled, dangerously elegant post punk/no wave woven temptation.
Vienna hailing, Lady Lynch consists of Theresa Adamski, Philipp Forthuber, Lina Gaertner, and Christian Sundl. There is little more background wise we can tell you about the band but musically and especially with their new album, a flood of praise carrying words is unstoppable. Individual in character and imagination, their music is something akin to a fusion of The Passions, Au-Pairs, and Lydia Lunch trapped within the band’s own unique web of post punk/no wave taking in further new wave and punk hues. Across ten tracks it provides an inescapably hypnotic lure of brooding intimation and gloom cast atmospherics around riveting vocals as tendrils of sound unite their skilled monotony to seduce ears and imagination. With every listen it has become more impressive and irresistible, addiction rising by their side.
The album opens with Fundamental Friend Dependability. Rising from a sonic squall, the track swiftly drops into an espionage coated stroll, firm rhythms almost taunting ears as vocals and a cold melody entice. It took barely a rush of seconds before the song got under the skin, its sober hooks and participation inciting chorus welcome trespasses alongside the great vocals. A superb start, the track as many across the album suddenly comes to an end, almost as if the release has got bored waiting to uncage its next thrilling incitement but a conclusion which only adds to the drama and tension.
The following Cymbals initially chips away at the senses before sauntering through ears with a gnarly bordering on predatory bassline alongside steady but imposing beats. Tenebrific in many ways, darkly radiant in plenty more, the song matched its predecessor in rapacious persuasion before Schatten Island casts its black and white hued intimation. Drums again provide a bold and influential backdrop, the bass the dark drama while guitar and vocals spring cinematic adventure; it all uniting in a Gang Of Four meets Bauhaus like compulsion.
Through the metronomic swing of Ranciere, a hip manipulator with moments of corroded discord, and the chilling melodic twilight of Noon, captivation only tightened its hold though both songs are soon rivalled in magnificence by the Crispy Ambulance-esque City Falls and all are in turn eclipsed by the Athletico Spizz 80/Pylon flavoured Actors and Networks where rhythms again play the body like a puppeteer as voice and guitar toy with the imagination; it all manna for ears and appetite.
A whiff of Cauldronated accompanies the mechanised corruption that is Tiny Machine while Stairs carrying a similar scent is an escalator of passing shadows and dark contemplation. Both tracks just enthralled as too did closing track Hommage. It is the darkest moment on the album and it’s most beguiling, beauty soaking every unsettled silhouette and slim but richly evocative contour.
Within one listen we were fully ensnared by the album’s caliginous temptation and devious enterprise, its seductive disquiet just as irresistible as its invasion of the senses and thoughts. One word sums it all up, Stunning!
The Lady Lynch album is out now via Cut Surface digitally and on Ltd Ed vinyl @ https://cutsurface.bandcamp.com/album/lady-lynch-2
Pete RingMaster 01/11/2018
Copyright RingMaster: MyFreeCopyright
A just as potent rhythmic lure fuels the following post punk shuffle of Lush Box. Spirals of guitar and flames of sax latch onto the swagger of beats and bass; the song’s jazz bred discord and post punk dance bouncing around like a Delta 5 meets Blood Red Shoes tango before Styling shares its own riveting devilment with a similar but quickly individual template of flavours. To be honest the rhythmic heart of the first trio had us trapped hook, line and sinker, all the other psyche infesting imagination icing on their inimitable cake with only the briefness of each song a frustration, a common niggle across the album.
The EP opens with Skicka Några Rader, beats instantly rapping the senses as hooks and riffs gather to launch their own equally inviting assault. Just as potent are Josefin’s vocals, melodic yet forceful and backed with matching command by Sara within a web of hooks and punk grooves. The bass is rich captivation, guitars an imposing lure as rhythms bite with an instinctive snarl. Together it is a riveting enticement with a great Au-Pairs like hue to its brooding enterprise.
In turn it is then eclipsed by Pleasure with its gorgeous Slits meets again Au Pairs like dub lit temptation. Within moments the hips of song and listener are swaying in unison, thought locked up in the provocative turns of voice and word as music infuses its own inventive dance into ears and appetite. More than living up to its name, the track is the pinnacle of the album’s theatre but closely matched around it and indeed by that recent single Far Gone. Almost unnerving in its psychosis fuelled canter, bass tones and scything key bred strings cinematically Hitchcock like, it is the driving rhythms and intensity of the song which brings it all gloriously together for another mighty incitement.
The sheer drama of the outstanding proposition continues through next up Phantasmal Planetoid. Its climate is instantly darker and more formidable as the bass snarls, never losing its heavy trespass as the song moves on to court a boisterous gait with turns of tetchier growls. It is masterful stuff, stoner and doom essences colluding with those earlier mentioned flavours as vocals and harmonies soar. No lightweight on addiction loaded hooks either, the song is manna for ears and instincts, a consuming persuasion also bred in the voracious antics of The Darkest End and immediately after within The Reverend. The first of the two aligns carnivorous riffs and bass irritability with spell spun grooves and the ever bewitching vocal union across the band. It resembles a fusion of Blood Ceremony and Jess and The Ancient Ones, yet is as individual to Kabbalah as you could wish for. Its successor is almost punk like at times, an underlying crabby edge flaring up across its psych and post punk spiced tapestry like a hybrid growth from a union of Au Pairs, Cradle, and Deep Purple.
Produced by the band and Marta Salogni at Strongroom Studios, London, Some Thing embraces ears with fiery directness straight away through Slug. The guitars of Ren Aldridge and Joe York dance as they sizzle on the senses whilst the jabbing pokes of drummer Zock reveal a swing and relish which only sparks stronger involvement in the swiftly contagious and dramatic encounter. The darker prowling tone of Liepa Kuraite’s bass adds weight to the thick lure of the song too, a tempting enhanced further by the potent vocals and expression of Aldridge backed as potently by York and Kuraite.