sebastian melmoth

Now I don’t mind admitting to being a tad bit distressed to receive a package from afar – well London way as it happens – inside of which was included a CD, a tape and a typed note that to paraphrase chillingly read thus ‘….two thirds of us are currently jobless and looks unlikely that we are going to survive the winter…..help us….’. a London based trio going by the name Sebastian Melmoth, for them not the spread of wordy hyperbole of false hope spread by well heeled press houses with influential connections nor the limitless financial backing of some nameless patron; instead their lot is executed and realised upon a slow acting intoxicant from out of which a mercurial craft slowly emerges that whilst not immediate plants a seed that nags, haunts and compels you to hit the repeat button for another serving which if there’s any justice in this world ought to shape up to be your new favourite sound resource. So taken by the contents of this package that there’ll be two bites of the cherry, so to speak, for this lot with the cassette – incidentally entitled ’the nausea of being’ – getting a stand alone review next missive out. For now though their forthcoming aural attraction. Due out next month ’in ruins’ is a bit like rummaging through the best moments of a well heeled record collection, there’s no bandwagon jumping or catching a lift on the latest passing trend or musical mood, if anything Sebastian Melmoth appear to operate in a void, secluded from outer influence and free of infection from blandness. that’s not to say you won’t hear amid these grooves familiar signposts that’ll make to ponder, think and with a wry smile nod sagely. Much like the forlorn macabre foreboding that soundtracks those conspirator theory videos often found on you tube proclaiming such things as the world’s destruction, secret alien intelligentsia, the illuminati and other such, opening cut ‘the engineering of consent’ is to find yourself stumbling hazily and blurry eyed upon a secret sonic summit meeting headed up by a gathering of Goblin and Godspeed types bleakly purring out prophecies of doom and puncturing the falsehoods of existence. On the other hand ‘Miet Mitzvah’ is demurred and traced upon a subtle laid back Velvets afterglow that unfurls midway through into shimmering hazes of fuzzy monochrome post punked dialects to recall elements of Left Hand’s ’minus 8’ set curdled in quick space essences. Long time admirers of the Pixies especially from pre ’Doolittle’ days will do well to fast forward to ’catching up with morrison’, a deadheaded lock grooving mantra that manages to warp within its groove space elements of a flat lining Television and Tom Waits to weave a wiring and darkly crafted slab of fraying odd pop. Somewhere else there’s the sinister dark hearted opine of the grim charcoaled psych blues carnival of the Paul Roland-esque ‘black September’ whilst there’s something uneasy, parched and stricken permeating through the stilled monastic like ‘prosopagnosia’ a stalker like obsessional slab of chilled psychosis that wraps its spidery austere goth-ique spiders in a choking strangle hold like a creepy Felt. The set is brought to a close by ‘Presley Honey’ – all said ‘in ruins’ best moment by a nudge and the merest hairs breadth, certainly the most radio accessible track of the seven and perfectly framed in a psych dub braiding that to these ears had us much recalling a youthful talking heads. An early bench mark setter for 2014 by our reckoning. http://www.sebastianmelmoth.co.uk

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