#folk-step

[warrenrecords]

[powfag]

[iheartmoosiq]

"Triangles are my favorite shape"

Or so sings Alt-J on one of their songs, who obviously really do love triangles. Here they are performing Ripe & Ruin, one of the interlude tracks from stand out debut album An Awesome Wave (again, one of my best albums of the year so far). The short, a capella performance uploaded by The Bowery Presents is haunting in its perfect harmony. These guys are breaking every rule about genres, and making it work so well. I just learned that some people are calling their sound "folk-step". That's a new one on my list. They're hard to define, and oh sooooo dang good. As if triangles couldn't get any more "hip"... pshh... ;)

[backstagepassmusic]

Tour Alert:

Everyone's favourite folk-step quartet, Alt-J, are embarking on a headline tour of the UK at the end of October. For more info, click here.

[sealonpsychedelics-blog]

Album Review: An Awesome Wave

Alt-J // An Awesome Wave // May 28 // Infectious

There comes a time when I get seriously tired of bands that try to act quirky and mysterious. Secrets are all so 2011 aren't they? Here we have a quartet from Oxford that don't like showing their faces in photos and their name is actually a triangle (Alt-J is a shortcut to a triangle symbol on a Mac, go figure). Considering that they're all students and such obnoxious Apple endorsement might make them sound like a combination of everything that is currently hip but rest assured, their debut LP An Awesome Wave is not weird enough to scare away anyone outside of the triangle totting circles.

"Triangles are my favourite shape" claims singer Joe Newman on Tessellate but seriously, don't expect Alt-J to wear hipster glasses and have inverted cross tattoos on their arms. Their music is far removed from trends and technological advances, instead dealing with folk that is influenced by the internet rather than any of its creations. They fuse the gentle guitar sounds, that are not dissimilar with The xx' more direct moments, with unsteady hip hop beats and a whole lot of other random moments that can sometimes feel like they're just throwing anything in for the sake of it. They still attempt to charm the listener and tracks like Breezeblocks and Matilda do their job well fusing head-nodding tendencies with a fucked up campfire storytelling (the lyrics on here are just plain ridiculous in their ambiguity) and sing-along nature. The separate parts of An Awesome Wave might sound like a calculated and dull attempt at covering as much ground as possible but the quality of songwriting intertwined with a couple of interludes makes for an disjointed if never boring listen.

Admittedly, moments on An Awesome Wave makes the album more like a thunderous tsunami going far over everyone's heads. When you're trying to conjure just what the band are doing in the context of their peers it's possible but rather disorienting to come up with 3 or 4 bands that they are paying their dues to on these tracks. 80s jangle pop, 00s indie, some r&b thrown in for good measure, hip hop, even bhangra. An Awesome Wave might be linear enough without ever becoming boring but it does however sound like sometimes it just doesn't know where to go next, trying to spread itself over everything left and right. Take the pop bliss of Breezeblocks followed by a minute long acoustic interlude just to arrive at Something Good which utilises reverb and piano more than any other song on here. It might sound like there's a progression with the interludes spread across the LP but in the end you just get the feeling that a good part of An Awesome Wave is a bunch of ideas held by strings that blend into the background. Not to mention the vocals which purposely sing in a quirky tone just for the sake of it. An Awesome Wave has that elusive "urban" quality to it but it comes in quantity over quality ideas rather than sound.

Rather than a campfire album with an ambition, An Awesome Wave is an exploration, albeit one that moves at an almost uncomfortable speeds. It shifts and turns corners too quickly making the songs on here feel more disorienting than they actually are. Some ideas are interesting despite it coming across as an experimental record An Awesome Wave is a stale one that will impress the Ed Sheeran crowd while the rest will find interest purely in how well calculated it is. Then again, you wouldn't expect some prominent soul from a band called Alt-J would you?

[listenpunk-blog]

If you listen to one album this week make it Alt-J's An Awesome Wave! Alt-J ∆ are one of the most exciting British bands around at the moment with their unique sound which combines crushing synths and tight vocal harmonies with folky verses.

Give it a listen I would be surprised if you didn't fall in love with the quirky quartet from Leeds. In case you have become so enamoured with Alt-J you can find out when and where they are gigging here. 

You can stream the whole album on Soundcloud and Listen Punk I suggest you do it!